A recent trip to the dentist resurrected an odd piece of my childhood, actually it was something thousands of other young boys experienced also. When I entered the room to get my teeth cleaned the first thing the dentist said to me was “hey I was on YouTube the other day and I saw your name so I pulled up the piece and it was you being interviewed about swimming naked.” Apparently the dentist needed to hear the story directly from me to confirm I didn’t make the whole thing up. I had not made it up. Oh, one more thing, the 30 something hygienist in the room was now looking at me askance and I could see the thought cloud above her head…”do I want to put my hands in this guy’s mouth?” I proceeded to tell these two professionals that it was common practice back in the 1950s, 60s, and into the 70s for young boys and girls to swim in public pools at high schools and at park districts on weekends with one catch, or was it catch and release, the release being your swim trunks. Not exactly true, the girls got to wear bathing suits the boys did not. No it was not coed, each gender got their specific time to use the pool. Hell, if this setup WAS coed that would’ve probably gone without any hubbub either. So every Saturday I swam starkers with a number of my fellow classmates at Fenger High School on the south side of Chicago. Nothing like being naked 10 year olds in a pool and then 48 hours later in a classroom together like nothing strange ever happened. And that’s the way it was. I don’t remember any strange behaviour associated with the practice, no inappropriate conduct between anybody and no lingering trauma. However, we didn’t have access to counselors like they do today so we just banked a lot of stuff and moved on, we had no choice even if we needed to talk to anyone. I do remember my curiosity prompting me to ask a lifeguard why we had to swim naked and his reply was “because if you go to the beach you might have sand in your trunks and bring it into the pool and clog the filter.” Two things, I never went to the beach and the girls got to wear swimsuits and their suits had more material to collect sand. Oh well. Not too strange to have this conversation with an adult male in swim trunks and me nude. That’s the way things were back then, no seatbelts, doctors endorsed cigarettes, making fun of alcoholics was no big deal and young boys frolicked full monty at the local pool on a Saturday. We were nowhere near WOKE back then, in fact we were fast asleep and we liked it. Right?
Gunga, galunga
G. Miller