Hold on!!!


I am reminded of another brother.  Yeah, we lived an exciting life.

There was a small walking weir across the water.   We swam on the calm side.  The other side of the weir was dangerous.  The water was swift and deep, and we knew we could never swim on that side.

 

One of my brothers, Luke, who was very small at the time, about five I guess, decided to see if I was paying attention to him.  I was down on the sand, reading a book and knew he was playing somewhere--he was okay.

 

"Hey!  Look at me!" 


I looked up and saw he was standing out on that weir all  by himself.  I was so scared that  I screamed at him, "Don't jump!"

 

But he did.  He said he didn't jump on purpose.  He said I scared him when I hollered at him and it became my fault.  It was my fault since I was supposed to be watching him.  A lesson was learned by a near tragedy.

 

You know which side he went off of don't you?  Not the calm side.  It must run in the blood.  genes.  Whatever.

 

He looked like a soaked cat with his hair in his eyes.  He was crying.  I was crying.   But you know what?  He still had the cookie in his hand that he was eating when he walked out on that weir.   It was running out between his fingers, but he was holding on to it.  Tight!  He said he knew he had to hold on to something or he would drown.

 

I don't remember if he could swim at that time or not, but  he could dog-paddle real good.


I Said Hold on!!!

 

Another time, we were back at the river swimming and having a picnic.   Daddy told us there were whirlpools at this place, and showed us how to identify them.  We were very careful to stay away from the swirling waters.  Really we were.

 

Except for the middle brother.  He was wading out, just meandering  along like little boys will. A soda pop to sip on when his mouth became dry.  I don't know what flavor it was, but I bet if I ask him, he could tell me.

 

Well, you know what happened--he got a little too close to the swirls.  Dad saw him go down and   we all saw him come up.  Daddy went out to retrieve him and his soda pop, which he was hanging onto like a life rope!

This was a learning experience and we all liked to learn.  We took every opportunity life threw our way.