No matter what the calendar says, the thermometer says it’s officially summer in Oklahoma. With nothing but 90+ degree days in the forecast, we decided it was time to get the boys a pool. So we bought them a good ol’ redneck swimmin’ hole from Wamalart.

We have had this pool for a whopping two days, and it has already taught me several valuable lessons.

#1 – I have no more patience as an adult than I had as a child. The day and a half it took to fill that thing was excruciating.

#2 – A pool is a lot more fun when your not the grown-up who has to take care of it.

#3 – Oklahoma has a lot more fuzzy airborne plant-type-things and tiny bugs than I ever realized.

#4 – I should have enjoyed by younger “chubby” body. Turns out I didn’t even know what “chubby” was. One decade and 2 children later, I have come to terms with the fact that I will never again be seen in a swimsuit.

#5 – When you pass 30, you lose all ability to ignore the fact that your body parts are shriveling up and dying a slow, cold death while you play in frigid water.  Now I understand why all the “old” people sat in the hot tub while we kiddos splashed around in the icy pool.

Basically, in the span of two days, this pool has destroyed all chances I ever had of clinging to my twenties, and exposed me for the thirty-something I really am.   I’ll be spending the rest of my summer sitting in the shade in my lawn chair, wearing a big floppy hat, a bathing suit cover-up down to my ankles, and socks with my sandals.

My advice to you? Yes, you, the one who has convinced your kids you’ve been 29 for the last 5 years.  Send them to the neighbors’ house to swim.