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EDITOR'S NOTE: Fred Miller is on summer break. This is a vintage column, originally published Aug. 4, 2001.
The sun had already been down half an hour when we first jumped into the pond. I could hear the alarmed honking of our geese better than I could see them in the fading light. The summer air was moist and still. Its warmth wrapped us like one of Ol' Food's patchwork quilts. When I hit the water I was surprised by its warmth, too.
I had promised Worshrag we'd go swimming after working in the garden, but trellising the dipper gourd vines took longer than I had thought. If Nature Boyd, the neighbor boy who'd rather walk the fields than play video games, hadn't suddenly appeared out of the corn, we wouldn't have gotten done.
I was tired, and considered telling Worsh it was too late now to go swimming, but I had promised. Besides, we had an extra boy to multiply our fun.
"It's dangerous to go swimming after dark," my cautionary angel whispered in my ear.
I swatted him.
I listened to another voice, the one telling me that nights like this are pearls on the necklace of life.
Worsh and I were wearing cutoffs. We left our work boots and shirts on the land's end of the pier. Nature Boyd was wearing blue jeans so he stripped down to his skivvies.
With a whoop and a holler, we jumped into the pond. Whoo-ee!
Hitting the water for the first time can be a shock, but not so on this night. It was like diving into a warm bathtub. Pond water, left to itself, stratifies by temperature, with the water at the bottom quite cold. But tonight, the water down below was only cool. I could feel it with my toes as I tread water.
When I built this pier years ago I used two long locust posts for the end pilings. Farmers use locust for fence posts because it resists rot. The pier is three feet above the water's surface, and the top of the pilings is seven feet above the pier. I nailed a thick oak plank across the tops, making a narrow diving platform, reached by way of a rickety wooden stepladder wired to one piling.
The water off the pier's end is 10 feet deep, or was before the current dry spell. It's a good thing the mud at the bottom is soft because my feet reached the mud every jump.
Worshrag and I climbed the ladder and stood together, dripping into the water far below and gathering our courage for another jump.
"Let's jump together, on the count of three. You count," said Worshrag.
"You won't jump."
"Sure I will."
"No you won't. We'll count to three and I'll jump and you won't, and then you'll jump on top of me."
"No, really, I want us to jump together. We'll hold hands."
So we held hands, I counted, and on three I launched out into the air. By myself.
"You jerk!" I sputtered when I came to the surface, but Worsh was already on his way down, wrapping his arms around his knees to drown me with a cannonball.
The geese, dimly visible (the white ones) in the fading light, continued to raise a ruckus but it wasn't because of us. Our two dogs, Joyous and Dumbbell, were swimming up and down the pond trying to catch them. Joyous has been swimming after the geese for years, but this is the first year young Dumbbell has gotten into the act. I was surprised by how fast the younger dog could swim, and the geese were alarmed. Two dogs! No fair!
There was no chance of the dogs actually catching them, but it was great sport for them, and fun for us to watch. Every time the plodding dogs got close, the geese flapped their wings and were at the other end of the pond. Sometimes a goose, panicking, would foolishly think itself cornered and dive, popping out of the water 25 feet away.
"Let's catch a goose!" Worshrag said. The next time a convoy of geese and dogs swam by, we three dive bombers attacked from the air.
Worshrag missed. I missed. But Nature Boyd surfaced with an armful of white goose.
"It's all right, girl," he said soothingly, stroking the long white neck. He had caught the tamest one, and though not happy about being caught, she wasn't exactly distraught.
Worsh decided if he couldn't catch a goose, he'd catch a dog. As soon as he grabbed hold of Joyous, he regretted it. She's strong, and her instincts told her that when in the water, keep paddling. Her front claws raked his chest good.
The little light we had was almost gone. We'd churned up the bottom muck enough to give a definite stink to the water, and ourselves. It was time to go, I told the boys.
Worsh begged for one last dive, which turned into two, then three, then it was definitely, absolutely time to go. We slurped into our boots, slung shirts over shoulders and dripped away from our warm summer night's swim.