A long sigh escapes my lips as the diminutive ripples in the ocean blue water caused by my big toe cease.

Glancing at the clock, my fellow lifeguard and I know it is time to open the dreadful green door and let in a sea of diverse characters. Parting like the Red Sea, my fellow guard saunters down the pale clay deck to bring disturbance into the peaceful environment while I move to my guard chair. Sitting down in the unstable chair, I prepare my ears for today's war against the pool's acoustics while mentally arranging my thoughts. A lifeless "let them in" signal accompanies my comprehension that being a lifeguard requires a high level of thinking and maturity in order to juggle diverse yet concurrent situations.

The peaceful sound of lapping waves is all of a sudden murdered with the opening of disturbance. The wall of chlorine or winter water is no match for this sea of diversity - the swimmers will disturb the ocean blue paradise no matter what. My eyes start to move like a Ping-Pong ball as an avalanche of spandex destroys my clear view of the pool's bottom black lines. Only five minutes into the public swim, problems begin to surface. As I rise from my chair and drop the ancient flutterboard to the deck, my ears give me the first warning that they are losing the acoustic war again.

Once I reach deck level, I have to choose whether to yell at the back divers or tell the floaters to remove themselves from the fitness lane. Since I have no intentions of practising first aid today, I charge over to the opposite side of the pool in time to prevent a teenager from spilling his brains all over the deck. At this precise moment, I manage to catch out of the corner of my eye, two other teenagers trying to find recuperation in the sauna. As I pry open the door, a blood-curdling scream echoes throughout the pool. My eyes quickly scan for explanation as the teenagers display the wonders of the English language. Another scream of terror brings my eyes to a crying baby applying a vise grip to her parent. Maybe one of those cheery red lifejackets would drown her screams and aid my ears at the same time. Trudging to the shallow end, my mission to get the floaters out of the fitness lane and aid my ears is interrupted by a group of joyful children I involuntarily baby-sit everyday. I know the annoying, "I want a mat," is gurgling in their vocal cords. After a brief lesson in manners, I inform their plump faces that no mats will be given out because of yesterday's surfboard incident.

Thanks to the quick jumps of the surfboard kids, another spandex avalanche leaves my dull guard shirt a clammy bright red. The time seems to be moving as fast as a turtle this afternoon. All of a sudden the familiar sound of a bass drum rattles my ears. The noodle-slapping kids are back in full force and this time little Bobby has a prune hand on a flutterboard. Unfortunately, the noodle-slapping group is too wrapped up in head bashing to hear my protests, so the whole pool gets to stand at attention with a termination whistle. Nonetheless, the silence is short lived when the boisterous laughing of children commences right after I confiscate the slimy, cold flutterboards and noodles. With a pungent chlorine and Styrofoam mixture under my arm, it is time to get the floaters out of the lane.

"Lifeguard, I had an accident," is all that it takes to divert my attention from the floaters to a little girl who resembles a red finger-paint experiment. Dropping the giant teething rings and giving a signal to my fellow guard, I seize her smooth hand and briskly move her to the first aid chair. Wrenching a piece of gauze from its paper prison, one hand applies pressure to the clown nose while the other fumbles to dial the three-digit front desk code. When another staff member answers I can hardly hear since the laughing, crying and screams of the swim have grown into a hammer that is pounding the back of my head. I manage to summon a staff member to the pool and reassure the little girl as I see people swimming to the bottom and staying on the black line out of the corner of my eye.

There is one boy on the bottom of the pool. The group has surfaced but the boy remains on the ocean paradise's floor. A boy can hold his breath for a long time, but not forever. Cautiously moving forward I realize that all my years of experience, teaching and training are about to come down to one moment of truth. This is it; I'm going in. All of a sudden, the pool did not sound like a ghastly orchestra tuning horrible instruments - instead there is silence. Stepping to the edge of the pool, my heart is in my throat while I inhale my final breath before my whistle sings a song of terror to the other guard.

Another whistle blast sends shivers up my spine. The boy surfaces and claims his prize of popularity for being an idiot. Another whistle and some yelling echo throughout the pool. The frightened turtle who needs a cheery red lifejacket had peas and carrots for lunch. As the sea of diversity begins to retreat, my ears sigh with the decrescendo in noise level. Never in my life have I been so ecstatic to slam the pump-circulating button.

A long sigh escapes my lips as the diminutive ripples in the ocean blue water caused by the water vacuum cease.

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