Burger Bash

This has been a busy week-end at the neighborhood pool. On Friday night, there was a Burger Bash, which we attended. On Saturday, there was a Midnight Swim, which would have involved either organising a babysitter or dealing with very tired children for the rest of the week-end. Neither seemed worth the effort, so we passed on that one. Then tonight, there was a Jazz Evening planned, but it's been cancelled this afternoon, or postponed at any rate, "due to unforeseen circumstances".

The Burger Bash was fun. It involved burgers, hot dogs, baked beans, salads, a big range of desserts, and swimming. Very pleasant. Life always looks up at the neighborhood pool. Sitting on a lounger under a sun-shade, burger in hand, happy children cavorting in the water, I watched the Stars and Stripes fluttering gently in the breeze above me and thought "well, I wouldn't be doing this in Scotland. Not if I valued my extremities."

I haven't been persuaded into purchasing a two-piece swimsuit, but I have bought a squaw dress. I'm not sure if I should call it a squaw dress. I haven't worked out the pc issues and vocabulary relating to Native Americans, except that I know I'm meant to call a buffalo a bison. So maybe I shouldn't say squaw dress, but I don't know what else to call it. It’s a shift dress, black with big, striking, blue and purple flowers, and tassels round the bottom. I feel it is a bit short for someone of my advanced years, but Midwesterners are very casual, so I can probably get away with it (and my legs are better than my midriff). It is suitably 60's for the pool scene. I also feel a bit more respectable wandering home through the neighborhood with a squaw dress over my swimsuit, than with a towel wrapped insecurely round my waist. I like it, and anyway, it was on the reduced rail at Wal-Mart.

I think my friend Fran would be pleased with me. She says she doesn't mind me quoting her in my blog, so long as I don't call her 21-yo (actually, she isn't, but you get the idea). In fact, Fran put her finger on something rather important (must be all that leafing through the Boden catalogue that gives you super-accurate fingers). I told her I was thinking I should acquire some hippy 60's gear for the pool, and she emailed back "Go you! Join the film set. Life's too short to observe from the wings." This is, I think, the very heart of the ex-pat condition. Can I ever truly be part of the action? And do I want to be? It certainly feels rather safer to be on the film crew side of the camera, but I think Fran is right. It's more fun to be an extra. Specially if you get a great costume like a squaw dress.