Who Says One Person Can't Make a Difference?

(This post falls under the "and Beyond" portion of this blog.)

Summer swim team season wrapped up, as of Wednesday night, and our team ended with a final ranking of 20th, out of 26 pools. We missed 19th by 0.5 points. Granted, 20th is the best our modest pool has done in years, but I'm thankful it is a modest little pool with modest expectations and modest people because it is ENTIRELY my fault we didn't get 19th. I assumed (and we all know what happens when you assume) that I didn't have to get my son to the Clerk of Course until the first call, only to discover, once we got over there, that he was supposed to be there five events ago and had missed his race. Given his seed time, and assuming (again) that he wouldn't have cramped up and sunk to the bottom of the pool, that meant good-bye 11 points. Crud. Crud crud crud.

If we belonged to one of the giant, Olympian-producing-machine pools in our league, I would be fearful to show my face there the rest of the summer, lest I be bludgeoned to death with Otter Pops. As it is, we'll all go swimming Saturday, and I'm sure everyone will be as friendly as ever. (Even as I write this, another swim mom emailed to assure me there'd been at least one DQ among the girls--see what I mean? Modest and friendly.)

I'll have to do penance some other way, like reading the mystery novel on the shelf agented by someone at the upcoming writer's conference, or struggling onward through WHAT MAISIE KNEW. I'll tell you what Maisie knew: that her parents were tiresome and that James does not write beach reads.

Yes, I must turn my mind to next week's conference, with its potential for adventures and disasters new. Hope my ten-minute editor's appointment doesn't pair me with one like at that last conference--the editor who pinned me with a cold eye and whom I couldn't get a word out of even after three direct questions. Yeeks. Maybe she had a kid on our swim team.