We decided to go to the pool at 4:45 today. We had been inside all day because we've had something every other day this week, and I needed to clean the bathroom and also plan out our schedule for the fall. "Mary Poppins" was watched. Pajamas were still on. At 4:45 in the afternoon. So, we walked to the pool. We got Hudson some flip-flops a month or so ago, and he still isn't used to walking in them. He kind of marches and picks up his entire foot and smacks it down flat. It amuses me.
We did not apply sunscreen. I sat on the side of the pool, in the shade, with a book. I read a few sentences, then put it down so I could watch the kids. Harper is really independent in the water now. I don't know that her form is especially conventional, but she is quick and sure. She loves her goggles that cover her nose. Hudson is independent too, but he still has moments that look a little too much like drowning. He also loves his goggles that cover his nose. Helena does not like to go underwater, so she wears a floatie unless I am in the pool with her. It is almost too small, so next summer she will have to learn to go underwater. She will be ready then.
Helena enjoys making friends at the pool. Today she was drawn to a large group of kids who were having a great time with a large ball. "They are very NOISY!" she complained. Then she sidled over (can you sidle in the water?) and started splashing them and shooting her water gun at them. They were old enough to be delighted instead of annoyed. I tried to figure out what language they were speaking. It was English, then it wasn't. One of the girls, who wasn't swimming, came and sat near me. I asked her if they were all brothers and sisters. She said four of them were her brothers and sisters, and the others were her cousins. "We just arrived from Nigeria," she told me. I asked about the language. "It's slang--Nigerian slang," she said. I asked if it has a name. "Pidgin, I guess," she responded. Then she asked why English here sounds so different than the English spoken in her country. I said I guessed it was because they learned to speak British English, and we speak American English. Then I corrected myself and confessed that we actually speak Texas English, which is an entirely different thing. She thought that was funny. She told me she was 14. She looked at me shyly and said she has never really talked to a white person before. She said, "I have never had a white friend." Well then, I replied, now you do. We will be friends. She smiled and clapped a little. I asked her name, and told her mine. "Party!" she exclaimed, and I did not correct her. Then she asked me what books I like to read ("I saw you reading your book and I knew then that you must love to read!") and if my kids like to watch Nickelodean. She told me there is a character on a show whose name is Harper. She said she liked my kids' hair, and that if they were in Nigeria everyone would want to touch it. She asked why my girls ears weren't pierced. She asked if we had air-conditioning in our house. She told me about the bribes they had to pay at the airport when they left Nigeria. She said everyone in Nigeria wishes they could come to America. She told me that at her school, the nuns whip the black kids but not the white kids because the white kids' parents complain when their kids get whipped. I asked where the white kids were from. She said, "I think Japan." She wants to be a doctor when she grows up. She said her brain does not work as well when she wears her glasses. "Do people wear their lenses in the pool here in America? I saw a man with his lenses on in the pool!" I told her my husband does not wear his glasses in the pool. She wondered why I didn't name either of my daughters after me. She said it is done very often in her country. She said her mother is pregnant with her sixth baby. She hopes it is a boy because her sisters talk too much. She asked me if I like snow or heat better. I told her it rarely snows in Houston, but that we enjoy it when it does. She lamented that it has never, not even once, snowed in Nigeria. Then it was time for them to go. She stood up very formally and stuck out her hand to shake mine. I shook her hand, then I gave her a hug. Even though I am not technically a hugger.
It's funny because on Saturday, we had a birthday party at a large church where there happened to be a Nigerian wedding happening at the same time. The ladies were finely arrayed. Helena was very intrigued by their finery. She noted that all of the wedding guests seemed to be fancy and also "brown." I reminded her that we are all sort of brownish, just in various shades. She wished she had worn one of her costumes and could go to the wedding. I told her maybe someday she would.
That is all. Now I won't forget my new friend.
