Tags: [chemistry], [pool]

Parker’s Motel | Lincoln, NH 10/04/2024 2:57 PM 

In that same motel, I found myself jumping over a wire gate to visit the pool. It was drained to a disenchanting puddle. Insects crawled across the painted blue concrete. My first lap around the pool, I found these piles of rocks. Are they man-made? Store-bought? Formed over time? My only hypothesis is that it is made up of chlorine. It reeked of my summer night hair in my youth. I could feel the stiffness of my strands after swimming with my cousins, the dry eyes I'd get after overcoming the fear of opening them under water. It’s like denim when it’s bleached. It’s that ol’factory letting the nostalgia gears turn.

The rock is porous, cracked, pure white, and unidentifiable.