It's My Turn Now

It was like any other hot, late summer afternoon. The air was thick, the trees dripping with the sap of lush foliage and brilliant blooms. Steamy, humid.

We had decided to go to the pool with friends.

As the day unfolded we picnicked, slathered suntan lotion on ourselves and dipped in and out of the cooling waters of the beautifully chlorinated, immaculate suburban waters. It was a day of rest and relaxation for the mothers...and a day of entertainment and exercise for the kids. What could be better?

It started out harmlessly at first. Two or three––or was it four?––smallish, pre-pubescent boys played a game of sharks and minnows in the deep end of the pool. A harmless game... until they told my girls they couldn’t jump off the diving board.

I am a good girl. I like to play by the rules, unless they are absurd. So I did what all good girls do. I checked with the lifeguard.

“Can the girls jump off the diving board?” I ask. “Oh...yeah. They can jump.”

So I turn around and motion for my girls to go jump off the board. They’d been waiting. They would have gone ahead and jumped, but they are nice girls...and you see, to them, these seem like young and powerful pre-pubescent boys blocking the way. They have held up an orange cone on the board, and they are declaring a “NO JUMPING” zone while they dominate the deep end with their shark and minnow antics.

No. I won’t have it. If my girls want to jump, they will jump.

I look over at the lifeguard. He’s immersed in a conversation with a voluptuous 16-year-old brunette. No help.

So I walk up to the most powerful leader of the pack. I face the eight-year-old with the eyes of blazing fire and say, “My girls are going to jump off the board. Move the cone.”

“No jumping during sharks and minnows,” he says.

“Move the cone,” I say. “Is your mom here?”

“You don’t even know who she is.”

“Move…the…cone! My girls want to jump.”

He moves the cone in one fell swoop.

I sit down. I chat with my friend for a moment. I’m thinking this might just be the end.

I’m tired; it’s time to go home. But I glance back at the board, and realize in horror that my girls are waiting patiently at the base of the board, while rascal after rascal pops up and cuts in front of them without waiting.

And my girls sit. Waiting. Playing by the rules. Waiting, while the little boys in front of them splish and splash, jumping and diving without a care in the world. Cutting, budging, cutting and budging...because they can.

I notice that my eldest is standing there with her arms crossed at the chest. Her jaw is set, and her eyes are focused. Beneath her well-composed, polite frame lies a horse behind its gate at the races. She breathes the fire of freedom. She stands on the fragile foundation of justice.­­

Just a little bit of encouragement is all she needs.

I smile. And then, I bellow, across the pool: “Girls! Do NOT let those boys cut in front of you!”

I look around and the scene is silent. A pool full of suburban moms are looking my way.

I don’t care.

“Go, Marmee!” says my friend, who thinks she has just experienced a holy flashback to Little Women. She chuckles, picturing the feminist mother of all mothers reincarnated, visiting her justice upon this contemporary scene. I shrug, pleased in a way, but still a little nervous at what will happen next. I look on with anticipation.

Along with the poolside audience, I wait to see if there will be a change in this society of boy-dominated pool politics.

Ahh...yes. The change, the shift. The strong, brave girl—my daughter— marches forward.

“No cutting!” she says.

And with the permission she has now given herself and the power she commands from the neighborhood pool boys, she throws back her shoulders and stalks onto the board and onward down the plank, easily brushing aside a few sniveling boys who dare attempt to cut into her path.

The atmosphere changes now. With a stomp and a leap and splash, she breaks the societal rule. The energy of the male-dominated pool has shifted. The boys have sifted and separated and moved toward the sides and the girls are looking—timidly, yet excitedly—at one another as they approach the diving board, once forbidden, now free for the taking.

Girl after forbidden girl walks the plank and jumps.

And I look on with a sigh and wonder...will they remember?

For I know now that these things happen. Today. And they will happen again tomorrow.

There will be skinny young men my girls will encounter again. Big boys and small boys that will push their way to the top at the sake of my girls’ genteel manners.

And I wonder: Will they look back on this afternoon with horror and embarrassment?

Will they remember their crazy mom making a scene in front of all the neighbors? Or will they remember their strength? The spins and twirls and turns they took off the diving board in the very midst of that sharks and minnows game?

And will they remember the sound of that power? That beautiful sound of the female voice that says: Stop! That’s not okay. You can’t stop me, it’s my turn now!

Kirsten Miller is a psychotherapist and a professional labor assistant. She lives with her three daughters and her husband in Peachtree City, GA.

~Kirsten Miller