Swim Season Wraps Up At Palmer Pool

It's the last hurrah for the staff at the Palmer Township Community Pool.

With Labor Day weekend's arrival, summer is over, well at least unofficially. But for the pool people, another season has come and gone like the setting sun: The pool closes for the year on Monday.

"I have mixed emotions," assistant pool manager Sue Maguire said. "I'm both happy and sad."

For pool manager Diane Mullen, who has overseen the pool for the past 17 summers, she hates to see Labor Day come. But she said a break for at least a few months will be nice.

"It's been a long summer," Mullen said. "We've been here seven days a week. But the winters are long. We'll get itchy for pool time in the spring."

Mullen calls this summer a success, even though pool memberships were down and Hurricane Irene shut down the 380,000-gallon pool last weekend.

The, which opened Memorial Day weekend, this summer did experience a rise in walk-up sales, which Mullen said were about 20 percent higher than past years. But now traffic has slowed. And the for the holiday weekend doesn't look too promising.

"It's supposed to rain Saturday, Sunday and Monday, so we'll have a really slow weekend," Mullen said. "Our regulars will show up to get the last of summer."

Maguire agreed, stating that once school starts, "people lose all concept of swimming."

It doesn't help too, she adds, when a storm comes through "because the ."

Her daughter Samatha, ending her second year as a lifeguard, will be sad when Monday ends.

"It's been a pretty good summer," she said. "I liked being able to enjoy it here at the pool and make money at the same time."

While Rachel Manta, 18, is sad to wrap up her fourth year at the pool (she operates the snack bar), she is looking forward to next year.

"Working the snack bar has been really fun. But it gets hectic when it's hot. The lines are really huge," she said. "But I made a lot of friends here. It's been really awesome."

Next summer, Manta will have a new title: assistant pool manager.
She's already counting the days, looking forward to her new duties.

"I've watched others about how much you grow as a person," she said. "I won't be so shy. I'll be taking on new responsibility and that will help me to grow."