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Sunday Punch Steve Johnston

Swimming In It

I dove into my pool and discovered a swamp of work

This time of year I can't help but remember the day I thought I was making the smartest move of my life.

We were thinking of buying a house, and it had no yard. When those few sunny days in Seattle rolled around, I thought, I wouldn't have to start the endless mowing, trimming, whacking, weeding and everything else that goes with having a yard.

What this house did have was a swimming pool. Instead of grass, I'd have 33,000 gallons of water encased in cement right outside my back door.

The pool was a selling point. I actually had thoughts of our four kids swimming and playing in it when they weren't beating on each other.

A hot tub is built into this pool, and I pictured the Truly Unpleasant Mrs. Johnston and I sitting in the tub on warm summer nights, clicking our wine glasses together and enjoying a full moon. After getting too hot, we could roll over into the pool and cool off with a few laps.

But something happened between the time I bought the house with the pool and the end of the first year we lived in the house. That something is called reality.

Next to having children, the most labor-intensive thing a couple can do together is buy a house with a swimming pool. Like a child, a swimming pool requires constant monitoring. You have to take its temperature, and when the temperature goes up, you have to start adding chemicals so it doesn't get sick.

But unlike a child, a swimming pool must be fed "medicine" around the clock. I have a garage full of chemicals to keep the pool feeling good. At least with the kids, I don't have to feed them chemicals every day to keep them feeling good.

The first few years with the pool went pretty well. The kids were in it every day. I liked to have a few laps after work, and we used the hot tub on the weekends. But our kids grew up and started their own lives. While the kids were becoming less dependent on Mom and Dad, the pool didn't change in its demands. The water still needed to be balanced, the giant filter had to be cleaned and the leaves had to be skimmed off.

I started putting a cover over the pool earlier in the year so I didn't have to clean out the leaves and worry about stuff blowing into the pool.

One year I decided to leave the cover off, but that stunt left it exposed to the elements, and the pool caught a bad cold. Another year I found out it was just as dumb to leave the pool uncovered for more than a couple weeks. When I went to clean off the leaves I found out I had created what looked like a chemical experiment gone bad. The pool water was almost black, and the more I skimmed off the scum on top, the worse it looked.

When I fished out as many floating things as I could, I called the pool man and told him I had a chemical experiment growing in my yard. He chuckled the way people chuckle when they are going to take you to the cleaners. Sort of like the chuckle your mechanic gives when you tell him that you were running the last few days with the red light glowing in your dashboard.

After the pool man gave me an estimate, I told my three sons that it was time they paid me back for the room and board. It took almost the whole summer to empty, clean and fill the pool. You cannot appreciate how much water is in 33,000 gallons until you have to drain it all out and then fill it from a garden hose.

Now I keep the pool covered with a huge blue tarp. You can probably see it when you are flying into SeaTac.

While our kids have moved on, I can't say the same for the pool. I looked into filling it with dirt and turning it into a garden, but that's not allowed. Something about the water table. Before filling it in, you have to get a jackhammer and break the pool into tiny pieces.

I guess I will keep "the cement pond" in the backyard. But now I can understand why the guy I bought the house from just chuckled when I saw the pool and said to him, "I never had a house with a pool. It looks like fun."

When we sell the house, I will also try not to smile too much when the new owner says he always wanted a swimming pool.

Steve Johnston is a retired Seattle Times reporter. Heather McKinnon is a Times staff artist.

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