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Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: Shrewdness (03/07/05)
Nanky was always the shrewd one among all of our cousins. He grew up to be a successful car salesman which surprised none of us.

Anyway, one summer he and Grandma came to Alabama to visit us. Now Daddy was a preacher and we – my two brothers and I – were always under the gun to be Christian examples to the congregation. So of course I, as a girl, wore a dress all the time and couldn’t ever go swimming in the creek with the boys in case my dress hiked up and revealed a private part of myself. So I stood on the bank and stuck my toes in the warm water and watched the boys splash and scream. A good little girl was I!

So one day when the boys were splashing and I was watching them, Nanky asked me why I didn’t jump into the creek. I told him it was because I was a girl and a Christian.

He came out of the water, dripping, and pulled me in. Of course my dress swirled around me and revealed my unmentionables to the boys, but they didn’t seem to notice. They were too busy running and hollering. I stayed downstream from them and lay on my back in the shallow water. I bounced my legs and flapped my arms so that the warm water would splash on me. Never had I felt so cuddled and comforted. I stayed there until the boys were done. It was the best afternoon of my life.

Of course when we got home my brothers tore into the house and told Mom that Nanky had pushed me into the creek, so Mom scolded him and got me a dry dress out of the clothes hamper, but no one thought to tell Mom I had shown my legs and stayed in the creek for quite a while. Nanky winked at me after his scolding and I grinned back.

He always knew the way around any rule. He was shrewd, but I sure did admire him!
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This article has been read 1358 times
Member Comments
Member
Date
Lynda Lee Schab 
03/14/05
"Nanky was always the shrewd one among all of our cousins. He grew up to be a successful car salesman which surprised none of us." I will have you know that my husband is a car salesman - and an HONEST one! LOL (Actually, he is getting out of the business partly because of the DIShonesty) :-)
Cute story. Made me smile.
Blessings, Lynda

Leticia Caroccio
03/14/05
Short and sweet. Loaded with lots of details and wonderful imagery. I smiled as I was reading. You are a storyteller. Good post.
Phyllis Inniss 
03/14/05
I enjoyed reading this story. You gave it an interest by your telling and imagery that placed it beyond just an ordinary event.
donna robinson
03/21/05
I could just see this character wanting to join in and trying to maintain what "everyone else expected of her". You let us feel her sense of freedom for a brief moment. Great read
Tim Liwanag
03/23/05
As far as your writing goes, write on! You made a beautiful piece out of a child's experience.