Chuckle-filled Memories

Though I've written about my poor memory, there are some things I vividly remember from childhood, specifically those sneaky moments when I slipped out from under my mother's well-honed radar. It is these memories that make me so aware of my own kids' shenanigans and why I'll probably never let them out of sight until they are at least thirty.

For example, many, many years ago, tucked behind where Zechar-Bailey Funeral Home now stands, before the houses and the retirement homes, there was an empty farm field with a splattering of trees at the center.

This tiny area, with its bike tire-worn paths and a hobo's camp, beckoned many nosey kids in the area, including my best friend and yours truly, during our elementary school days.

One afternoon "Sally" and I climbed the fence in her backyard (This sort of sneaking could only be accomplished at her house because we were almost a block from my mother's up-to-no-good radar.) and headed across the well-forgotten farm field to the trees. We followed the bike paths created by innumerable kids and warily crept past the hobo's area of a burned out campfire and crushed beer cans.

At some point in our rather lackluster misadventure we came across some awesome walking sticks and began poking and prodding along the paths, completely unaware of two older boys who had entered the area until they were standing right before us. We knew the boys from school but were taken back when they demanded our walking sticks. Sally and I promptly refused with wildly beating hearts that were now stuck up in our throats. Neither of us knew quite what to expect but we were resolute in not wanting to give up the sticks.

Now Sally was a tall, gangling thing, almost all feet more than anything and stood eye-to-eye with the older boys, who summed her up as an equal foe. So it was no surprise that their greedy eyes immediately fell upon me when the sticks weren't forthcoming. This was because I was Sally's complete polar opposite, short, stout, but surprisingly sure footed and fast, the latter being my advantage when I turned on my heel and ran across the field with the walking stick held high above my head.

One of the surprised boys gave chase but soon gave up when he realized I wasn't about to stop and Sally... well, she eventually caught up. I don't recall if the poor thing returned to the safety of her yard with a walking stick in hand, what she may have been thinking or even said to me after her best friend deserted her but not long after the incident our friendship was over.

That moment is forever frozen in my mind, at least that of my running across the empty field and whenever I pass Zechar-Bailey my eyes linger over the houses that have long since buried the past.

It's these memories that leave me to often wonder, as my little ones grow, what chaos they'll create without my ever knowing until someday they happen to recall it or write it down to my absolute chuckle-filled surprise or mouth-dropping horror.

Please, oh please, let it be the chuckle-filled.

Originally published Daily Advocate Jan. 2008.

Bethany J. Royer-DeLong is currently entrenched at home fighting the good war against the gimmes and the I-don't-wannas. She blogs recklessly, as all mothers of children under the age of six should, and has been working on that "supposed" great American novel, times a dozen. You can visit her at motherofthemunchkins.blogspot.com and email her at broyerdelong@yahoo.com