Still Waters: What a Public Pool Taught My Daughter and Me About Dignity, Calm, and Knowing When to Leave By D.R. Diaz
I don’t like public pools.
I want to be honest about that upfront. Not because I can’t swim — I can. Not because I don’t want my kids in the water — I do. I want them comfortable, fearless, fluid. Public pools carry a kind of tension I’ve learned to read over a lifetime. The cramped bodies, the
charged air, the eyes that find you a little too quickly. I’d rather Lake Superior. I’d rather the ocean. I’d rather anywhere the water is wide enough that nobody has to feel like an intrusion. Today, we went. Today reminded me why I keep going anyway.
The Setup
It was supposed to be a simple Sunday. Me, my eight-year-old daughter, and my three younger children — toddlers still learning what water even means, still trusting that Dad’s arms are the whole world. We were in the shallow end mostly, watching the brave ones cannon-ball off the 12-foot diving board, my daughter pointing and laughing, her little siblings wide-eyed and delighted. The pool was crowded. A lot of people who weren’t in the water. A lot of phones out. A lot of crossed arms and hard glances. I read the room the way I’ve always had to read rooms — not with paranoia, but with the quiet awareness that comes from being a Latino man in spaces that weren’t exactly designed with you in mind. I kept my peripheral vision sharp. I kept my energy calm. I kept my focus on my kids. Then the ball hit my daughter in the face.
The Incident A boy nearby had thrown it — hard, not playful. She, being who she is, generous and kind almost to a fault, assumed it was a mistake. She picked it up and passed it back to him. He moved out of the way. Let it drop. Then looked at her and said: “Miss me. Miss me, now you gotta kiss me.” She blinked. Passed it off as annoying kid behavior. I watched from a few feet away, holding one of my toddlers, and I let it go too. Kids say dumb things. That’s recoverable. Then he said: “Oh, never mind — I don’t wanna kiss your ugly fat-ass lips.” To my eight-year-old daughter.
The Choice
Where I come from — Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the blocks I grew up on — what happened next in that story usually isn’t pretty. I’ve seen people get hurt for less. I’ve seen situations like this ignite into something that follows families for years. I know what unchecked disrespect
can cost. I also know what overcorrecting costs.
So I made a choice. I looked at the boy, calmly, and I said:
“Can you be more respectful?”. Not you need to be. Not you better. Can you. Like a teacher asking a student a question they already know the answer to. Phrased as an invitation, not a threat. Because
confrontation escalates, and I didn’t want escalation — I wanted resolution. If not resolution, exit. He looked away. Didn’t answer. A moment later, my daughter told me he was making faces
at her from across the pool, taunting. I saw it from the corner of my eye.
I made note of it. I let it go. Because here’s what I know about martial arts — and I’ve studied it long enough to say this with conviction: the first technique is avoidance. Before the block. Before the strike.
Before anything. You avoid. If you cannot avoid, you de-escalate. If you cannot de-escalate, you exit.
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The lifeguards did nothing. The boy’s parents — if they were there — said nothing.
My daughter? She stayed calm. She listened. She swam away from the toxicity just like I told her to. That’s the win.
What I Told Her (What I Want Her to Remember)
When my youngest said she wanted to leave, I said yes immediately. As we gathered our things, I made sure my oldest understood something important: This is our space. We were here. We belong here. We chose to leave — not because we were chased out, but because toxic places don’t deserve your energy. There’s a quote I’ve carried for years: if a flower doesn’t bloom, you don’t fix the flower — you change the soil. We changed the soil. I also told her: when you’re in a toxic environment, don’t invest. Don’t match the energy. Figure out what’s happening, protect yourself, and move. That’s not weakness. That’s wisdom. That’s something it took me decades and a lot of hard lessons to learn.
What This Is Really About
I’m writing this for a few reasons. I’m writing it for my daughter, who is eight years old and already learning that the world will sometimes say ugly things to her face — and that she has the power to remain whole anyway. I’m writing it for my younger children, who will one day be old enough to read these words and hopefully find something useful in them. I’m writing it for every parent of color who has stood in a public space, read the room, calculated the risk of speaking up, and had to make a split-second decision about how to protect their child without making things worse. You know the math we do. You know the tax we pay just to exist in certain spaces. This one’s for you. I’m writing it for anyone — any background, any zip code — who has ever had to choose between pride and peace. Between reaction and wisdom. Where I come from, backing down looks like losing. I’ve lived long enough to know that sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is stay calm, speak with dignity, protect what matters, and walk away with your head high. We didn’t lose anything at that pool today.
We taught our daughter something she’ll carry for the rest of her life.
On Spaces and Belonging
I think about clean water a lot. Lake Superior — the one time I swam in it — felt sacred. Pure. The kind of place where you feel like the environment is with you, not against you. I want
that for my kids. Safe beaches, clean water, spaces where the energy lifts instead of drains. We live in a world where that access isn’t equal. Where some people get to show up anywhere and be invisible in the best way — unchallenged, unbothered — and others walk in
and immediately become someone else’s test. I notice that. I document it. Not to stay angry, but because awareness is the first step toward something better. If you see a need, fill it. I see a need for quality, safe, inclusive swimming environments for families like mine. That’s worth building toward.
Still Waters
The image I chose for this post shows still water at golden hour. Quiet surface. Light breaking through. That’s what I’m after. Not the absence of conflict — conflict finds us all. The ability to move through it without letting it break what’s inside us. My daughter was still water today. She absorbed the hit, stayed calm, swam away from what wasn’t serving her. I couldn’t be prouder.
D.R. Diaz is a writer, father, and creator based in the Midwest. Follow his journal series on YouTube @DonRiveraDiaz.
Tags: Parenting · Mental Health · Race · Personal Essay · Dear Journal · Fatherhood · Self
Defense · Mindfulness · Family
