no skin off my nose.

i look like my dad. this is not an opinion- this is a fact. people who know my father but who have never met me will come up to me and say, "you must be ralph's son." our faces line in exactly the same way when we smile. our eyes are almost the same blue. it must be said that i have inherited an awful lot from my dad.

i have also inherited other, non-physical traits as well: the way i sigh, my enjoyment of red wine and potato chips (not necessarily at the same time), and, unfortunately for most, my father's pool brat tendencies. put my father near water and he immediately becomes devilish and remorseless, an unpredictable hooligan. i have a distinct memory of him pulling our good family friend joanne into a backyard pool while she was fully clothed and in heels. my dad once flipped a paddleboat with my mom in it (for the record- have you ever tried to flip a paddleboat? it ain't easy brother). my mom did not find this quite as entertaining as my dad did. you can't stand on a dock or on the side of a pool when my dad is around and not get mercilessly tossed, pulled, or flipped into the water. and i must say the same is to be said for me.

let me make this clear- neither of us are a pool bully; we're not in it to drown. we are rather pool brats. if you ask me, we're not in it for harm or hurt, we're in it solely for fun. a good time, a laugh, a charming anecdote to go along with the occasional scar or bruise. however, if you ask my sister, who has bravely born the brunt of this behavior for just shy of twenty years, she might sing a different song. actually, she probably won't sing in front of you, but she will certainly offer a different perspective.

this trait inspires a kind of reckless abandon in the water, one that applies not only to my interaction with others but also to my own actions. and believe me when i say that i have been burned before. i have felt the horrifying sting of a front flip off a metres-high boathouse gone terribly awry. i have been smacked in the face by canoes, surf boards, pool noodles, sea turtles, lighthouses, and one mermaid who looked remarkably like darryl hannah in 'splash.' once i wiped out spectacularly whilst water skiing and smashed the handle so hard across my thighs that i had a perfectly straight bruise for the rest of the summer. but somehow i just never learn. these are not the moments i remember.

had i remembered them i might have been more cautious when chris and i were in the whitsunday islands two weeks ago. i might have thought back to more disastrous instances when we got to whitehaven beach with the pure silicone sand and the spectacular surf. i might have remembered my mistakes when we trounced into the crashing waves to body surf. had i remembered my past i might have been more careful, i might not have climbed onto a huge barnacle covered rock emerging from the ocean and posed for snapping cameras on the beach on my perilous perch, and i most certainly would not have dived off the rock, face first into the very shallow water. i would not have scraped the skin off most of the bridge of my nose and part of my forehead and would not have spent my time in one of the beautiful places in the world being photographed with a giant wound smack dab in the middle of my face. i would not have had to continually disinfect it with betadine, an iodine-based liquid that left my nose a lovely shade of orange so that i looked not unlike gonzo the muppet. i would not have been asked by everyone on the boat, "what did you do to your nose?" none of it would have happened were i not such a giant pool brat.

alas, we are born as we are. some are born redheaded, some are born eunuchs. i was born a pool brat and i will likely be this way until my dying day. so i guess i am deserving of temporary disfigurement.

who's the bigger pool brat you ask, me or my dad? right now i would have to say it might be me. by a nose.