Practicing the Laughing Stuff

 (This message was edited by smilingsun on 08-10-03 @ 7:30 pm EDT)



An Embarrassing Moment

As a young girl, my family lived next to a river that flowed through the valley. My brothers and I spent our summer days swimming, or building sand castles. We hiked for miles up and down the levee, having the freedom to do as we chose, most of the time.

We loved the life, and I lived in my swim suit. I would pull a pair of jeans or shorts over it, if I had to, but I wore it almost constantly. I was always ready for a quick swim. I had to be ready, because if my brothers decided to go to the water, they wouldn’t hang around waiting for me to change clothes.

Our house sat at the corner of a T road. One twisted its way from the paved road about a mile down, where our mailbox stood, meeting the other that went to the two weirs, north and south, and followed the river for miles both ways. Fishermen were always coming and going, as there were good fishing spots all along the river. They didn’t use our road much though, they usually came in from the south road. So, we really didn’t have a lot of traffic going by the house.

One day, I was playing with a ball out in the dirt lane, close to the canal that ran off the river. I was throwing it up and catching it, bouncing it, and not paying any attention at all to my surroundings.

My ball of course, bounced into the canal, and began to float away. I wasn’t too concerned, because I knew I could retrieve it. Quickly, I stripped my shorts off, preparing to jump into the water.

I was standing in shock, looking down at my under pants, wondering where my swim suit was, at the same instant a car drove around that last curve, about fifteen feet from my flaming red ten-year-old face.

I didn’t know what to do, so I tried to hide behind the closest object available, a telephone pole. As the car slowly passed me, I moved, inch by inch, around the pole, keeping it between me and those laughing faces I knew were inside the car.

I know now, the only thing I hid, was my sight of them. I don’t know why I didn’t just jump into the water, except we didn’t swim in our clothes, and I didn’t have my swim suit on. After the car turned the corner, I rescued the ball, and ran into the house to find my swim suit.