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The Hot Spot
Op-Ed Commentary
Yesterday I went to the hot springs at Radium to relieve my aches and pains; we purchased season passes this year. There are a couple of outlets where the water is a lot hotter that I try to get to; however, a septuagenarian couple had already positioned themselves in front of it.
The hot spot etiquette is that you find a place a little way from the glory hole and wait to slip in there when whoever is โhogging the spotโ has finally had enough, usually about a 20 minute to half hour wait. I position myself and prepare to wait.
After about 10 minutes a gangly octogenarian covered in tattoos enters the pool, wades directly across and plants himself between me and the couple in the hot spot. In other words, he is jumping the line-up. He is joined by his wife and we wait.
I am steaming about this and decide I am going to say something to him. A little later as the couple who have been occupying the coveted outlet are moving off the fellow who has jumped the line starts to move. I quickly move out around him saying, โNow just a minute, I was waiting in line and it is my turn. Donโt be rude.โ
He says, โI was not being rude.โ A few other bathers within earshot kind of laugh at this and I take the pause as an opportunity and slide past them into the hot spot. O how I love that spot!
After soaking a good while I move off across the pool to sit in the cooler water before exiting. I must admit one does people watch while luxuriating in the pool. I had noticed an older and very trim looking woman, tall and well formed, wearing a skimpy bikini had entered the pool. As it happened, I was within hearing distance of her as I was cooling down when to my surprise she began a conversation.
At first it was just a bit of chit chat about where you are from. She was quite a talker, and within a few minutes I knew that she was single, 67-years-old, has just moved to Windermere, had bought a six-bedroom house and had a man living with her although she made it very clear that he was just a renter living in the basement helping to pay the mortgage.
I noticed she wore a multi diamond ring on her index finger. She had a delightful accent and it turns out was from Montreal and came out west after a divorce, is a singer-songwriter and worked singing in bars in Edmonton for six years before moving to Kelowna but quit because the smoke bothered her.
I couldnโt help but notice how fair her skin is and the way she kept adjusting the top of her bikini to prevent it from exposing even more of her breasts did get my attention. I enjoyed this little exchange, and the view of the huge snowflakes slowly drifting down, I even felt a little flattered. Could it be possible that she was actually hitting on me?
I was beginning to feel young again and had fallen into a dream-like state when she launched into a long monologue about Dr. Freeman and how all Covid vaccines have been contaminated by Bill Gates. My God, she was an anti-vaxxer! She had seen Bill Gates on tv saying something about there being too many people on the planet and from this discerned that he had conspired with the drug companies and governments to contaminate all vaccines in an effort to reduce earthโs population and, that all who take the vaccines will be dead in either six months or seven years depending on which contaminated vaccine dose one gets. They had staggered the contaminated doses as a cover up, even the regular flu shots were contaminated!
It is interesting how oneโs perception of a person can and does change once you hear them out.
Rather than seeing this person as a good-looking sexagenarian on the hunt for endowments I now began to suspect she was, well I may as well say it, a bit crazy! In an attempt to get her off the topic of Covid conspiracies I asked if she had recorded any of her songs. She said yes and then began to serenade me, right there in the pool. I kid you not! It was enchanting. She had a lovely voice and maybe I would have stayed longer just to see if she would actually allow a word in edgewise, except I had now been in the pool for nearly two hours and was overheated.
I interrupted her singing and said that I was cooked. She asked for my name as she adjusted her bikini top again. I stood straight up out of the water, puffed my chest and fled to the change room.
โ Peter Christensen is a Columbia Valley based writer and poet.