Not sure whether Lawler kids still take ‘swimming lessons’ at New Hampton Pool…but here is my experience back in 1954. It was published in the New Hampton Tribune and Des Moines Register in March 2014 almost 60 years after it happened:
High Board Anxiety
With winter soon to be in our rear view mirror and summer hanging on to the heels of spring, I have been thinking about my youth in Lawler; and the thrill of learning new things each season. One such event was the year I learned to swim at the pool in nearby New Hampton.
I am guessing it was circa 1954 when my 10th birthday had arrived. To be able to swim in the ‘deep end’ without supervision, it was necessary to be approved by an instructor, but only after performing proficiency in floating, back floating, breast stroke and other such tests. There was one, indeed, which required overcoming a phobia ingrained in me: I am afraid of heights.
The east end of New Hampton Municipal Pool at the time had five diving boards. The high board in the middle was approximately 10 feet above the water. To me it might as well have been 100 feet and terrified me! Below it on both sides were middle boards, probably five feet above the water, and on the outside of these, low boards a couple feet above splash down.
I had completed every task except bounding off the high board. The high school girl swimming instructor urged me on, “Don’t worry. You can do this. I’ll be here to catch you the minute you hit the water! It’s okay to jump. You don’t have to dive.”
Frankly, I did not share her optimism. Simply getting to the end of the board was ominous enough, let alone leaping to certain death at the end of that sojourn. “Nope,” I hollered down, “can’t do it.”
“Sure you can, Bill. Run out quickly and leap without thinking. It will all be over in a couple of seconds and you’ll be so proud of what you did. It’s the only thing left to pass your test,” she coaxed.
Buying time, and secretly hoping that the horn signaling the end of swimming lessons would blast, I asked, “Is it okay if I sit down and push myself to the end of the board?”
“That would be fine,” she agreed, much to my chagrin. “Do whatever it takes to get to the end of the board and then drop into the pool. But hurry. We are running out of time today.”
Now the rest of what happened is somewhat cloudy in my mind. After all, it was 60 years ago and sometimes a little difficult to separate historical fact from fiction. But I recall that time stood still, everyone else departed from the pool to watch, and the instructor looked up at me with a conglomeration of empathy, exasperation, hope, and evil in her eyes.
Now I was doomed. She had agreed to my demands and there was no honorable way out. My buddies, the Timlins, Scallys and Leonards, who could do double back flips off the high board, would surely never let me forget this moment if I chickened out.
So, ever so slowly, I crept out toward the end of the board lifting my rump with my arms. She looks up. I look down. All eyes are on my next move. My white knuckles are velcroed to the diving board. My 10-year-old heart is pounding.
“Jump, Bill. You can do this. Close your eyes and jump!”
I really want to please her and want to get this over with and want my stupid buddies to look the other way, but I’m terrified. And not even half way to the end of the board.
“Come on. Do it. I will be so proud of you.” But for some inexplicable reason she turned her head, just for a split second.
At that very minute I did it! I pushed myself off the side of the board into the depths of the deep end at the east end of New Hampton Municipal Swimming Pool. Seconds later I came up to surface grinning as if I had successfully leapt off the Grand Canyon into swirling rapids.
And she missed it! Well, she probably heard it. But she didn’t see it.
Since I’m 70, she must now be in her mid to late 70s. I wish I knew her name so that I could thank her and apologize for taking so much of her time and energy that sunny summer 1954 morning. Hopefully, she will read this and remember the little red headed kid from Lawler who listened to and heeded her urging. She was able to sign my ‘Certificate of Passing’ to allow me the right to swim alone in the deep end.
One last thing. You might be wondering how many times I’ve since jumped off a high board in the six ensuing decades since that momentous occasion. The answer to that question: Zero. I’m afraid of heights!
Bill Sheridan
8106 Brookview Drive – Urbandale, IA 50322
515.669.4913 (Cell) 515.276.4790 (Landline)