Weekend at the Lake, or The Agony of Being Boo

This past weekend we spent some time at my uncle’s lakehouse. The kids really love it there; they go swimming, boating, and even horseback riding.

One of the big things they like to do is jump off the roof of the boat dock into the lake. It’s kind of a rite of passage, to be old enough to not be scared to jump from such a height. (The lake is 25 feet deep so there’s no actual danger, by the way.)

In past summers we have had conflicts over this. One I remember in particular: GG (at about age six or seven) promised she would jump off if I did it first. So, even though I am prone to swimmers’ ear and HATE getting my head wet, I climbed up and jumped in.

And she didn’t jump.

And I got swimmers’ ear AGAIN.

But I digress….

Last summer Boo (now age seven) was afraid to do it, but this year she confided to me before we went to the lake, “The first thing I’m going to do when we get there is jump off the top.”

And she actually did, fairly soon after we arrived.

The problem came after the second or third time she jumped. She landed wrong and hurt her leg when she hit the water, so that the next day, while GG and ET were vying for the record number of jumps (I think we passed fifty by the end of the weekend), Boo was afraid to jump again.

Which would have been fine if she hadn’t kept climbing the ladder, standing on the roof, and agonizing at the edge. This prompted her sisters to say, “If you climb back down the ladder and don’t jump off, you’re an official chicken.”

NO! Not Official Chicken Status! Oh the horror!

So Boo proceeded to sit up there, torturing herself, and not jumping. On the roof of the boat dock. In the blazing sun. For FORTY-FIVE MINUTES!

Finally it was time to go back in, so my mom made the older girls promise NOT to bestow the title of Official Chicken on Boo because she was being forced to come back down the ladder by adults.

They reluctantly agreed, with one caveat: that she must jump off the top the NEXT day, or they would be forced to call it like they saw it. OFFICIAL CHICKEN, thy name shall be Boo.

So Boo came down the ladder and back into the house for dinner. And moped around all evening, until she forgot about it, of course.

But her sisters had not forgotten.

The next day we all went back to the dock. I’d already had a talk with GG and ET about the hurtfulness of name-calling, and they had been STRICTLY FORBIDDEN to call Boo an official chicken or any other type of chicken.

So they didn’t.

Instead they swam around, calling out things like, “Hey Boo! I like CHICKEN noodle soup!”

And, “Fried CHICKEN is my favorite dinner!”

And so on…

After another stern talking-to, they mostly stopped. But then later, after I’d gone back inside to put the twins down for a nap, Boo decided to climb up to the roof for another try.

Thus reviving the whole Official Chicken Discussion.

After another half-hour or so of Boo’s anguished deliberation on the roof, my uncle decided to put an end to the whole thing. He climbed the ladder, grabbed Boo up, and jumped in the water. Then he swam back and herded all the kids into the house.

Oddly enough, it worked. Boo came back in a much better mood than she had the night before, and nobody was calling anybody poultry of any type.

And now I guess everyone has forgotten about the whole thing.

Until NEXT summer....