WATER WORLDS

I can hardly believe that the children are back at school and summer is almost over. Although I adore my 12-year-old son Noah - life (and The Evergreens where we live) is so much calmer, more predictable and easier when he’s not around!

We ventured abroad again this year (mad fools that we are with an ADHD son) - Mallorca was our chosen destination; both our accommodation AND our flights were booked by yours truly over the Internet - so the family waited with baited breath once the flights were safely over with to see what my Internet skills had served up in the way of accommodation.

I positively glowed with satisfaction as the family surveyed the apartment. It was superb, rooftop terrace (Noah’s eyes lit up at the sight of the spiral staircase leading to goodness-knows-where in his imagination!) - lovely soft towels in abundance (I have a ‘thing’ about towels) and a washing machine. What more could a harassed mother want you ask. Well, the site did promise “five separate swimming pools, with streams and waterfalls……”

I can’t recall if it was before or after we glanced at the authoritative notice on the entrance to the apartments about “communities” and something about “no noise before 9:30am or after 10pm” that we heard vague screams from the direction of the pool area.

Seven-year-old Alice, unable to contain her excitement at the prospect of five different pools, had scooted off as soon as we started to unpack - she was a woman with a mission, swimming costume on back-to-front and pinching her little bottom, armbands and goggles in hand she ran off into the (within shouting) distance.

Now when you have an ADHD child in the family, screams coming from their siblings usually means one of two things: either they have yet again demonstrated their amazing ability to turn a calm quiet scene of family bliss into an earthquake of at least force 5.6 on the Richter scale. Or……… they are nowhere to be found having observed a potential drama unfolding and, knowing they are usually the prime suspect, fled the scene of the crime “just in case”.

Surprisingly - Buzz and I both looked at each other on hearing Alice’s screams, with a “what has Noah done this time“ look. We were just about to tear down to the pool when we were greeted by a soggy, tearful Alice, armbands and goggles still in hand and loud sobs drowning out our questions of “what did he do?”, “are you okay?…..”

“Frogs – mummy. Not Noah,” she stammered, “Frogs, where?” we said stupidly “In the pool of course,” she spluttered.

When we went down to investigate, the frogs were the least of our worries; the pool was floating with debris - leaves, empty wrappers and a rather suspicious-looking, unhealthy rim of gunk around the edge.

“No bubbles,” muttered Buzz with his usual brevity.

“Bubbles?” I couldn’t imagine what he meant, unless it was the frogs……..

“The filters must be broken - there are no bubbles in the pool.”

Well, never mind we thought, there are four other pools to investigate.

Noah as usual was at least twenty steps ahead of us; we could hear the shouts of “Banzai” coming from the distance and started to wander in his direction.

Noah had dragged a variety of interesting “pool toys” to his carefully selected location.

Noah’s choice of pool was, I have to say, admirable. Surrounded by five towering, pure white villas with bougainvillea trailing from each of their three balconies - these were truly beautiful places to live.

The pool was of a similar design: there were three levels, each water-falling into the next, luscious plants everywhere, roman pillars and a waterfall. Gorgeous. At one end, was a sort of podium with three immaculately tanned bodies motionless on their pure white towels (recall I have a thing about towels!). My son completed the scene - he was happily launching himself from the top tier of the pool on his Harry Potter lilo - snorkelled-up like Captain Nemo and flippers to die for. The perfectly tanned bodies were peering incredulously over their very-expensive sunglasses at Noah. Who couldn’t have looked more out of place if he tried.

As we settled down to watch, Buzz nudged me. “We’re being watched,” he muttered. “Well he does put on a rather good show,” I sniggered. “No - up there, look.”

From the top of one of the villas a small group had gathered - they were pointing in our direction and tut-tutting. Eventually one of them appeared at the poolside.

“Ah you residents here my dear?” she pronounced rather too loudly. “Yes.” I waved vaguely in the direction of our apartment. “No, I mean ah you residents in THESE villas?” We obviously were not! It turned out that each pool was part of a community and we were decidedly out of place in this one! If we weren’t staying in one of the posh villas we couldn’t use the pool and it was the same with all the other pools.

As we were hurriedly gathering our things together and the perfectly tanned bodies were slowly lowering themselves back into position - Noah surfaced, completely unaware of what had been going on.

“Where are you going mum, I‘m having a great time down here - don’t go yet, I’ve found something at the bottom of the pool,” he protested.

“Let’s see,” shouted Alice, who plunged in enthusiastically before we could do anything about it.

As she surfaced she was coughing and spluttering. It’s a crab!” she shouted.

Frogs, crabs - whatever other wildlife was going to manifest itself next we asked ourselves!

Don’t be silly - how can a …………….No mum, it’s not a crab, its a lobster,” shouted Noah.

Buzz and I smiled quietly to ourselves - was this just another of Noah’s tricks or was it real? “Lets see,” squealed Alice. Buzz stood precariously on the edge of the pool while Noah poked it with his snorkel and sure enough, a lobster it most certainly was.

I have no idea why or how the thing got into that immaculate swimming pool.

Suffice it to say that Noah’s parting shot as he packed up his Harry Potter lilo, snorkel and flippers was “Hope you like lobster for tea YUM YUM!!”

Jan Assheton RGN RSCN is an Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Coach and Learning Mentor and the mother of a child with ADHD. She will be sharing the benefits of her personal and professional experience every two weeks.

NEXT INSTALMENT: FRIDAY 11 OCTOBER