the day I almost lost the birthday boy

Today is my son's birthday. He is 15. We are soon off out for a family lunch. I just want to briefly tell you about the time where I almost lost him.

We had moved to Spain. I had taken the kids out ahead and their mum would soon follow. I stayed with my sister and on the first day I decided that I would take all 5 kids (my two plus her three) up to the public pool. They were 10, 7 and 4 years old.
The pool was very busy. It was burning hot. The chlorinated water rippled an inviting blue. There were children plowtering and screaming and shouting. Others baked on their towels. There was barely a space to lay ours but I found one.
The kids bundled off their t-shirts. Except my son wasn't there.
I looked around in panic and tried to pick him out but I wasn't seeing anyone as my anxiety rose. I ran to the deep end of the large pool and there he was shimmering his way to the bottom. His arms were pulling at the water but he kept sinking. So I dived in, swam down to him. His face was beatific. No trace of panic. His eyes were wide open and his arms oscillated. He tried to say something to me in air bubbles. He was still sinking.
I got an arm around him and swam back up to the surface where we met a lifeguard and a large crowd standing watching us. They helped him out of the water and I climbed out.
The lifeguard was a teenager and said that she had seen him jump in and was about to rescue him when I had dived in. She didn't sound very convincing.
I looked down at my son angry and relieved in equal measure. My head fizzed with the possibilities in what had just happened.
My son spluttered a little but seemed untroubled. He then did something quite bizarre: he put a finger into his mouth and blew, puffing out his cheeks, trying to create pressure enough to empty any water he'd swallowed out of his ears the way they do in cartoons.
He was fine. Everyone went back to relaxing or playing in the water. I couldn't settle though and I soon took all the kids back to my sister's. I couldn't shake the possibility that I might have lost him that day. The first day of our big adventure in Spain. I mean, what would the conversation have been when I phoned his mum back in Scotland?

But I saved him and he's growing into a fine, sensitive, funny and caring young adult. We went for a walk this morning and I wanted his picture among the cherry blossom. The tender promise and hopeful perfume and colour of early Spring. It's all there ahead of him.

So I'm off to share his birthday with him and the family. What a pleasure.

Onwards !