In Illinois, my daughter and I went to the pool while my husband and son hung out in the room. There was another family in the pool when we arrived, mom, dad, baby boy, and a little girl probably a year or so younger than my daughter. The little girl was alternately swimming to her dad and kicking around in an inflatable inner tube. When they left, they left the inner tube.
“Mommy, can I use that thing?” my daughter asked.
“The inner tube?”
“Yeah, the inner tube.”
“No, honey. Those aren’t safe and sound to use if you don’t know how to swim. If you’re in the inner tube and you float over to the deep end of the pool and you fall out of the inner tube, you could get hurt if you don’t know how to swim. That other little girl knew how to swim, and you don’t. That’s why it’s not safe and sound to use the inner tube until you know how to swim.”
She accepted this reasoning, and we both agreed I’d sign her up for swim lessons once we got settled, and once she could swim, I’d get her an inner tube.
We finished up our pool session and went back up to our room.
Later that evening, my husband took both kids down to the pool again while I bummed around in the room and tried to access the internet. When they got back, my daughter greeted me with great excitement.
“Mommy! Guess what Daddy says I can get as soon as we get to Massachusetts!”
My daughter is, at this moment, wearing her new inner tube and waiting impatiently to go down to the pool.
Imperfect Happiness 
i think most husbands don’t even bother thinking about everything dangerous. and then when you express your concern aloud, do you get *Stop Worrying!* ? drives me nuts. i’m convinced that my girls would be scrawny, chronically overtired, with bruises and scrapes all over, ingesting every germ off of every shopping cart and door handle, unless i took the reigns most of the time. ya, a little neurotic perhaps 🙂
hey btw, never got a chance to say g’bye. BUT, being that i lived in Boston for 8 years and have vowed to return for a visit at some point, you may not have seen the last of us yet!
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oh noooo lol
The husband does this sort of thing to me all the time. Doesnt it just drive you crazy?
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It certainly causes me to roll my eyes and wonder if I should be more firm about my safety rules (or less firm). It was just funny to me how excited my daughter was and how pleased my husband was with his great idea. I think he just has a less vivid idea of all of the dangerous things in the world than I do.
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