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Baptism
by Linda J. Thomas

I’m watching Dad swim, with long smooth strokes of his arms, out to the raft he made. It’s a wooden platform resting on four barrels that rides the waves. The lake water is only up to my ankles. The orange life jacket, which my Mom makes me wear, feels like two overstuffed and hard cushions. One in front of my chest, the other behind my back, like a sandwich and I’m the filling in the middle. The sun is hot on my skin, the water cools my feet. The rest of my body wants to feel the same coolness.

“Come on, Linda!” urges my Dad. “The water’s beautiful!”

He pulls himself up the ladder on the front of the raft. He’s tall and lean and the water runs off him like a translucent skin he’s shedding.

I wade out to my knees and gasp as the water gets colder and the sand shifts beneath my feet. I “take the plunge” as my Dad calls it. The life jacket immediately rides up under my chin and the straps dig into my arm pits. I kick my legs and doggie paddle with my arms; keep my mouth closed and my nose above water.

None of this feels anything like how my Dad looked gliding through the water.

I rest for a minute, bobbing in the water and try to touch the bottom of the lake with my toes. It’s gone.

“Keep kicking!” Dad hollers. “You’ve almost made it!”

My Mom is watching from the screened porch. My Dad is waiting on the raft. I won’t allow myself to be strangled by a life jacket mid-way. I start kicking, and after what seems like an hour, I reach the raft and grab the rail of the ladder. My skin is tingling from the cold water and victory.

“I did it!” I can finally speak.

I put one foot on a rung of the ladder. It’s covered with a slimy, slippery substance that makes me fear green horned creatures lurking beneath the raft. I climb quickly to reach the sunlit platform. The raft rocks side to side in the waves from passing boats and I kneel down for balance.

“Want to dive off now?” Dad asks, although he already knows the answer.

“I’m staying right here!”

I take off the life jacket, use it as pillow for my head and lie on my back on the wooden slats. The sun is deliciously warm and dries the beads of water on my legs and arms.

My Dad dives off the raft and climbs back up the ladder. Again and again. The raft rocks in rhythm. I breathe in rhythm.

It feels like how my Dad looked gliding through the water.