As I sit at Great Wolf Lodge watching my children celebrate the first official day of summer break, I find myself doing what I always do around water: scanning. Not casually looking. Scanning. The exits. The lifeguards. The blind spots. The kid who looks lost in water that is a little too deep. The parents who swear they’re watching but are have deep conversations with their phones.
My friends will tell you I am absolutely insufferable around water. They’re correct!
I am the woman who reminds everyone where the life jackets are. I am the woman who notices when a gate is left open. I am the woman who will stop a pool game if it starts looking remotely like dunking, running and around the pool, or “let’s see how long Jack can hold his breath underwater.” If there is a pool within a fifty-foot radius, my nursing degree, lifeguard training, and anxiety all join forces to become one very powerful personality trait.
I didn’t become this way by accident.
The summer after 9th grade, I got my first job as a lifeguard at Nashville Shores Waterpark. Yes, I was 14. And yes, before anyone rushes to Google, the age requirement is now 15. We live in a fact-checking society now and frankly, I support it.
At the time, I thought I was applying for a fun summer job. I imagined wearing a cute red bathing suit (Baywatch), hanging out with friends, and earning enough money to support my teenage shopping habits. Instead, I accidentally enrolled in what felt like Navy SEAL training for suburban teenagers.
Nashville Shores used the Ellis & Associates International Lifeguard Training Program, and those people did not play. This was not a casual neighborhood pool certification where everyone gets a whistle and a congratulations. People got cut. People got sent home. Water does not care about your feelings, and neither did our instructors.
Looking back, I have tremendous respect for that.
Nashville Shores had built a reputation around elite water safety, and they protected it fiercely. Lifeguards were expected to perform at a high level because the consequences of not performing were simply too great. Lives were at stake. If you couldn’t meet the standard, you didn’t stay.
As it turns out, I thrived in that environment.
Not only did I earn my certification, but I was selected to join Nashville Shores’ Ellis & Associates National Lifeguard Competition Team. Even now that sentence makes me smile because it sounds slightly ridiculous. Imagine being fourteen years old and participating in simulated mass casualty events where dozens of screaming “victims” are drowning, panicking, disappearing underwater, and requiring triage all at the same time. Most of my friends were worried about pimples and boys. I was practicing disaster response.
Now before anyone accuses me of bragging, let me save you the trouble. I am absolutely bragging!
I have spent years trying to pretend I am not a high achiever when the evidence overwhelmingly suggests otherwise. At some point you simply have to accept who you are. Apparently, I was the kind of teenager who got excited about emergency action plans and rescue simulations.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that lifeguarding was quietly teaching me something much more important than rescue techniques.
It was teaching me competence.
There is something transformative about being trusted with another person’s safety. One summer earlier I was a teenager trying to figure out how to curl my hair with a new flat iron. One summer later I saw myself as someone capable of handling an emergency. Someone who could stay calm while others panicked. Someone who could be counted on when things went wrong.
That confidence followed me everywhere.
It followed me into nursing school. It followed me into being a nurse at the bedside during codes. It followed me into my years caring for critically ill children in hospitals across multiple states and coordinating their safe transfer to and for high levels of care. Long before I knew I would become a nurse, lifeguarding had already introduced me to the idea that helping people during their worst moments was meaningful work.
Unfortunately, it also taught me something else.
Water is beautiful. Water is joyful. Water is where some of our favorite family memories happen. It is also completely unforgiving.
Some of the most heartbreaking patients I cared for involved drowning injuries and diving accidents. Not because their parents didn’t love them. Not because anyone was reckless. But because tragedy often happens during ordinary moments when everyone assumes someone else is watching.
Which brings me back to Great Wolf Lodge.
As I watch these young lifeguards pacing the pool deck, never turning their backs to the water, I find myself feeling an enormous amount of respect for them. Most guests see teenagers. I see professionals. I see young people carrying tremendous responsibility while everyone else relaxes.
And honestly, I wish more Black and Brown parents encouraged their children to pursue lifeguarding.
Yes, the certification opens doors. Mine allowed me to work at country clubs, private homes, colleges, universities, and athletic facilities. One of my favorite assignments was lifeguarding Vanderbilt University’s football practices at six o’clock in the morning. Nothing humbles you quite like being awake before an SEC football team.
But the real gift is not the paycheck.
The real gift is learning responsibility. Learning discipline. Learning confidence. Learning that your actions matter because someone else’s safety depends on them.
In a world where many teenagers are spending their summers indoors, I love the idea of young people spending their days outside, moving their bodies, learning leadership skills, and developing a lifelong respect for water.
Will they get sunburned? Probably.
Will they complain about sunscreen? Absolutely.
Will they come home exhausted? Without question.
Will they gain skills that could save someone’s life one day?
Also yes.
My friends and family will continue teasing me for being overly cautious around pools, lakes, beaches, and water parks. I accept this as my burden in life. I will continue insisting on life jackets. I will continue giving speeches about neighbor’s pools and why we do not climb fences. I will continue stopping unsafe pool games. I will continue making everyone slightly uncomfortable with my water safety briefings.
Because after a lifetime around water, I have never met a parent who regretted being too cautious.
I have only met parents who wished they had been more careful.
So sign your kids up for swim lessons, Junior Lifeguards. Let them learn First Aid and CPR. Let them learn rescues. Let them discover what it feels like to be trusted with something important.
They may think they’re getting a summer job.
What they’re actually getting is confidence, responsibility, and perhaps the first glimpse of the person they are capable of becoming.
Always Have, Always Will ~ Kalie
