Of a Pool and a Pond

In the town in northeast New Jersey in which I grew up, there were two unique watery oases, Graydon Pool and the Wild Duck Pond Park, in whose company I spent many hours of my youth. Their locations within the boundaries of my hometown were as widely separated as the types of recreational opportunities they offered.  The pool was open only in the summer, and   town residents paid a modest seasonal badge fee to use it. The pond was open all year long, and was accessible to anyone. 

Graydon Pool was formed in the 1920’s when the stream running adjacent to the pool property was dammed to create the swimming area. In time, wells were drilled from whence cold water was pumped from the natural springs running beneath the pool to the surface. Encompassing close to three acres, the pool with its sandy beaches and grassy hillsides, was bordered on four sides by a parking lot, woods and wooden slat and wire fencing. In the middle of the swimming area, a stately sycamore tree rose up from a round grassy island surrounded with decorative stonework. Two vivid blue square steel rafts were anchored to the pool’s sandy bottom, and a pier extended out from the shoreline which provided access to the platform on which the low and high diving boards were mounted. The stone clad pool house that always smelled of chlorine, wet flip-flops and damp towels, provided privacy wherein to change clothes, shower and housed the bathroom facilities. Half a dozen bright white lifeguard stands were dispersed along the pool perimeter. Each season, the town would hire older teenagers to staff the stands and teach swimming lessons. From those stands warning whistles blared out accompanied by strident verbal admonishments; “No swimming under the raft!”, "No climbing on to the island!” and “One person at a time on the ladder!”. 

        Though the pool was intended for use by townspeople only, guests were allowed on a daily basis if accompanied by a resident. Prior to the pool’s opening in May, my parents would purchase our seasonal pool badges. The badges always needed to be on display after crossing on to the pool grounds from the bridge that connected it to the adjacent parking lot. It is here where yet another summer teen hire, empowered with what I’m sure he thought was a great responsibility, would scrutinize your badge before giving you an indifferent nod to continue on.  While at first I had to rely on my parents to take me to the pool, which pretty much limited me to weekend visitations, in time I earned their trust so that I could go it alone. Mounted on my blue and orange stripped chopper bicycle with the suicide handlebars, I would rendezvous with my neighborhood buddies, and we’d race to the pool the very first day it opened, and then most of every day after that until summer vacation ran its course. We’d leave our bikes in the bike rack and confidently traverse the bridge, as only a group of skinny, pale and awkward young adolescents could do.     

There were two rites of passage one needed to accomplish at the pool when old enough to attempt them. The first was learning how to swim, a skill one needed to acquire in order to avoid the indignity of being limited to swimming in the shallow end of the pool. Once that milestone was accomplished, then came the fearsome challenge of screwing up one’s courage to jump off the high diving board. My parents were quick to sign me up for swimming lessons, totally aware that they mercilessly began at 9:00 in the morning and lasted for two weeks. The pool being spring fed resulted in thousands of gallons of “invigorating” cold water gushing up into the pool each day. As you approached the water’s edge, you were faced with two choices, dive in head first and get the misery over quickly, or wade step by step into the deepening water, subjecting successive body parts to the water’s chilling embrace. I chose the quick immersion option.

As each hour long lesson wore on, the tips of your fingers took on the appearance of prunes, and certain portions of your extremities would take on a light blue hue. These anatomical warning signs provided the impetus to complete the lessons in what we hoped would be somewhere in the neighborhood of Olympic qualifying times. Lap after lap, sidestroke, breaststroke, backstroke and crawl, continually being spurred on by the entreaties of the teen instructor ensconced warm and dry at the water’s edge; “head down”, “even strokes”, slow breaths”, we suffered on in silent repetition and resignation. Lesson over, we exited the water, teeth chattering, bodies shuddering, and having wrapped yourself in the comfort of an oversized beach towel, you would acknowledge the shared bravery of your fellow sufferents with a knowing nod.  

If you survived not being afflicted with hypothermia at the lesson’s end, after thawing out you sometimes rewarded yourself later that day when the tingling of bells announced the arrival of the Good Humor man. He would step out from the open cab of his decal emblazoned truck adorned in a crisp white uniform and jaunty cap, sporting a change maker slung low from his belt like a gunslinger’s holster, and he’d ask what we wanted. There were so many delicious options, Toasted Almond, Strawberry Shortcake, Chocolate Éclair and my favorite, Creamsicle. Request made, he would open a small side door of the truck whereupon a fine mist would appear as he reached in to retrieve your frosty prize. Downing the orange flavored delight, I took great caution not to consume it so fast as to induce a brain freeze. Cold comfort indeed!  

The second crowning achievement in pursuit of peer pool acceptance, was to hurl oneself off the high diving board. I don’t remember how many times I approached the pier leading out to the diving board platform, but I’m certain it was a marathon’s length worth of steps forward and back. Then came the day, being tired of being the recipient of my friends admonishments of “chicken”, like they had the right to talk, I made my way out on to the pier, and headed towards  the base of the ladder that led up to the diving platform. Grabbing the ladder rails, hands sweating, knuckles white and heart racing, I methodically made my way up the ladder, one measured step at a time. My gaze never strayed from being locked straight ahead. Once on the platform, I inched my way out on to the diving board. No turning back now without suffering irreparable shame and embarrassment. Out to the board’s end I edged. I was being exhorted to “just jump” from those braver souls waiting their turn to risk death.  I leapt off into space. I must have hollered all the way down until I pierced the water surface, and I don’t remember how far down I submerged before starting to claw my way back to the surface. I do recall the euphoria I felt breaking the surface mercifully in one piece. As I exited the water, evincing a false bravado, I silently vowed to never take that leap again. I never did.     

 An underappreciated venue in our town was the Wild Duck Pond Park, a modest sized man made body of water created in the 1920’s, that was originally used for ice production. It is here that I went to wet a line in hopes of catching a carp or a shiner. You could get to the pond from my friend’s backyard after crossing over a small brook. While my mother wanted me to take the long way around via my bicycle, she conceded the overland route on the one condition that I not come home with wet sneakers from having “accidently”stepped into the brook. Carrying my pole, a Dixie cup filled with worms and a water filled five gallon bucket that I hoped would soon be brimming with fish, I looked to find a choice spot along the bank from which to cast my line. While searching for the perfect spot, I passed others trying their luck, and looking down into their buckets I would engage in standard fishermen etiquette by inquiring “Caught any?” Having claimed my territory, I impaled a worm on my hook, cast my line into the pond and riveted my eyes on the white and red bobber waiting for it to be pulled below the water, a sure signal I had achieved success. Sometimes I was rewarded for my efforts by reeling in a fish, while at other times I landed a magnificent clump of waterweed. At day’s end, as any good fisherman would do, I returned my catch to the pond.

On some days, a flotilla of remote control boats controlled by their onshore “admirals” would ply the pond and reenact historic naval battles. Resident geese sometimes filled the role of enemy vessels, though not by choice. On more than one occasion the geese, having had their fill of being chased, turned into the pursuers and emerged victorious having inflicted serious and sometimes fatal damage to the mock warships, a costly and embarrassing defeat for the water warriors. In winter, if the pond iced over enough, we’d grab our skates and stride from one end of the pond to the other. It was common for pick-up hockey games to take place at one end of the pond. I was always the goalie, not so much because of my skill at stopping pucks fired at me, but rather for my decided lack of skating prowess as the only skates I owned at the time where figure skates. Yes, that was embarrassing.    

Wooded areas surrounded the pond, in which picnic tables and charcoal grills were randomly placed. On weekends  it was a common destination for groups of different ethnicities to hold family gatherings. In many instances, these visitors came from towns and cities outside the confines of my monochromatic community. New York license plates abounded.  Walking through the park, unfamiliar languages being spoken caught my ear, as did new types of music I hadn’t heard played on the local radio stations I listened to. There would be people garbed in native attire, which was a visual delight for my eyes to behold. Sometimes a family would kindly offer to share the food they had prepared. The flavors I savored on those delectable plates were definitely at the very different end of the culinary taste spectrum from the standard picnic fare I was raised on. My entreaties to my mom to make the same things I tasted at the pond went unfulfilled. 

            Could a young boy ever hope to be more blessed than to know the joys of such a pool and a pond, and the time spent in their company? It was my good fortune to be that boy.