Dog Dad Hero

So over the weekend a friend of mine and his wife invited me to a barbecue at his parent's house. I hadn't seen em in a while and his parent's have a pool and stuff so I headed on up out of town. They said it was ok to bring Roscoe so he came along too. I was sort of curious to see: A. If Roscoe would be allowed in the pool. and B. if he is allowed in the pool, can he actually swim? I had some doubts about his swimability because when I was growing up I brought our family dog into a pool once and it actually did not know how to swim. I waded out with the dog and held it afloat and when I let go it would bring its paws all the way out of the water and then splash! and paw out of the water and splash! and it actually went under in a flailing panic. I got underneath it and held it up I was like, 'Dopey dog! How do you not know how to swim!?'

Anyway, I'm there for like a half-hour or so and Roscoe is running around the backyard off the leash and going up to the pool and sniffing at and running around doing whatever. A few people were in the pool and Roscoe definitely didn't know what to make of it. So I was drinking Mike's Hard Lemonade and keeping an eye on him from the patio table to make sure he didn't run away or jump on a kid or something (there were kids there).  I was happy that Roscoe seemed to be fitting in and was a nice dog and stuff. A little time goes by and I'm enjoying my Mike's (getting up the courage to change into my swimsuit and take my shirt off and go in the pool. I have body issues cause I'm too hairy) when all of a sudden I hear a big splash and look over at the pool and see Roscoe is in the pool! In the deep end! He like jumped in or whatever!

I'm not sure what happened next but all of a sudden I found myself jumping in the pool with all my clothes on. Some sort of dad-type instinct totally took over and I guess I felt like my boy was in trouble and I didn't care about anything else. I just jumped in the friggin pool and helped Roscoe get out of the water. I could tell he knew how to swim... but he was definitely psyched to be back on land. Honestly, the time between me first seeing Roscoe fall/jump in the pool and me actually being in the pool with my clothes on is like a blank slate. It was weird. The patio was like 30ft from the pool. I don't remember getting up from the table or running down to the pool. All of a sudden... I was in the water. Glasses splash flying off my face and sinking to the bottom the whole deal.

People at the barbecue sort of laughed at me for being in the pool in my clothes. And they told me that dog's are natural swimmers and I didn't need to overreact. But I had proof otherwise for one because of my dopey dog when I was growing up. And two, even though Roscoe could swim, I knew he had to be freaked out being in the water and was scared. Because I know him. And I was happy that I had a reaction that was probably right. But I gotta admit it, after Roscoe was safe on land and I climbed out of the pool soaking wet... it was a little strange how parentally instinctual it felt.

ok bye!

tOdd