Just back from the Red Hook pool -nothing much seems to have changed since we went there with the little kids or more recently with the grandchildren.  Regina has said that she feels closest to Maria in Wellfleet, I think I would have to say, for me, it's the pool.  After Maria had moved back to Red hook, she had enrolled Regina in swim lessons there.  They ended just about the time the pool opened for the public, so she already had a spot waiting for her family, under a tent, chairs all arranged in a circle.  If it wasn't a swim lesson day, you would see her coming through the orange door that led from the outdoors to the pool.  She always had a big beach bag with her.

The beach bag held books for her, books for the kids, swim toys, towels and food - popcorn, candy bars, all kind of snacks.  Of course the kids wanted to buy food at the snack bar, I think I remember French fries, smothered in cheese, or maybe it was nachos.

The man running the pool is the same, the lifeguards call him "coach" - he looks the same, blows the same whistle and loudly screams at the kids.  Today it was "Who's yelling?  Stop that yelling.  That's a hurt yell.  Do it again and you're out."  He blames the camp kids for leaving a mess, the babies for putting excrement in the pool, the big kids for playing too rough....he has his work cut out for him.  Today he blew the whistle and said he had heard thunder - nobody else did.  That means 20 minutes out of the water for everybody.  The kids hate when that happens, but the snack bar makes a fortune.

In the pool, I just float around in the deep part, looking at peoples' tattoos, hairdos, bathing suits- who is with who, that kind of thing,   But every so often, my eyes go to that orange door, looking for that familiar face, that big beach bag.