Throwing your rambunctious brothers in is one thing, and throwing your 4 and 6 year-old daughters in is something else, but I think I win the Stupid Award. My wife and I had been in Florida with our precocious 1 1/2 year-old, and she and I would go underwater in the shallow end of the pool and make faces at each other. We did that every day, over and over. I have no idea how that led me to think it might be a good idea to drop her into the deep end, but I have the clearest memory of lying on my belly on the low diving board, holding her by her ankles as she dangled beneath me, her head just inches from the water. She was squealing with excitement as I counted, “One… Two… THREE!” and released her. From my platform, I watched her sink like a stone to the bottom, where she lay, motionless. She made no effort whatsoever to paddle or rise to the surface. Panic hit me after a stunned three or four seconds, and I dove in, grabbed her, pushed off the bottom and shot to the surface like a rocket. She came up laughing.

My wife wasn’t laughing.