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Puddle Jumpers

This is a non-fiction essay I wrote. I revisted the first post I made for this blog. I hope you like it! Let me know what you think in comparison to the first post, or what you generally think!

Thanks! Hope you enjoy!

Puddle Jumpers

As I looked down at my feet, to keep the rain from hitting my face, I read the rubber tip of my left Converse shoe, watching it move front to back, front to back, in a mechanical motion. “Where are you walking today?”, my left shoe asked. “To the other side of campus for photography class,” I answered as another pair of feet approached mine.

I slowed my pace and looked around. Everyone is walking so fast, hoods up, looking down, trying to get out of the rain as quickly as possible, I thought. Like if they don’t get out of the rain, their fate will be similar to the Wicked Witch of the West that Dorothy threw water on. ‘I’m melting, I’m melting.’ I laughed a little as I imagined the tiny woman who just sped past me on the sidewalk as the Wicked Witch of the West. She clung to her black umbrella, with her oversized black rain coat, hiding from the heavy drops of water, the same way, I imagined, the Wicked Witch of the West did if she ever got caught in the rain.

I reached the open quad between University Hall and the biology building and saw the skyline for the first time since I left the dorm. Although filled with dark, heavy clouds, the skyline, was breathtakingly calm and captivating. On sunny days, the quad is filled with people playing Frisbee, and enjoying the weather.

Since elementary school we have been taught to avoid rainy days. Instead of getting to play outside, the whole school was forced to endure the humid, stuffy classroom, fighting for the best games, but, usually ending up with a purple, broken crayon and a coloring page of an angry dinosaur. Roar.

“Tabatha!”, my friend yelled across the quad. I looked over, waved, and watched my friend retreat back under his hood and into the library.

Rain. People act so differently in the rain.

Watching the people walk across the quad I noticed the almost robotic shifts in their path. Following the same footsteps as the person in front of them. No one ever straying off course to take a shortcut through the swampy grass. Everyone embarking on the same task: trying to keep the big, wet rain drops from drenching their clothes.

I wondered if the way people walk in the rain is how people wish they could walk everyday–avoiding the puddles. Avoiding jumping into something that might make us a little wet, but in the end give us a good laugh. What has happened to my simple enjoyment of playing in the rain?

When I was five years old, my favorite activity was running through sprinklers with my Little Red Riding-hood cape firmly tied around my neck. My neighbors and I could spend a whole day in our little swimsuit, on the front lawn, running back and forth through the sprinkler system. It never occurred to me that my parents used the sprinkler to water the grass, to me it was a game.

During the same summer of my Little Red Riding hood obsession, my neighborhood was flooded by a huge rain storm. The way I remember it, the water engulfed the entire street. Reaching half way up the tires of cars, which, to a short five year old, was to my knees. At our first chance, my friends and I played in this large, natural swimming pool. I imagine my parents, like the other adults on the street, were not as thrilled with the flood; mainly because it took over the basements. But, my friends and I were too young to understand or even care about the basement floods–we never wanted to go downstairs anyway, too scary. So, while the parents salvaged the storage in the basement, my friends and I danced, laughed, and splashed in the rain.

As children we understand the simplicity of happiness and joy; but, somewhere in between responsibility and adulthood, that understanding is lost. As adults, we begin to think too much about the tasks we need complete, too much about what other people think, too much to live the simple life of a child. Despite the limits of adulthood, play is not lost in adults, it merely becomes dormant. It becomes a matter of finding it inside yourself and releasing the mental constraints, even if it is only for a moment.

On my walk to my photography class, I began to appreciate spring rain because of the puddles it created. When I widened my perspective of the rainy day, I regained a sense of youth and freedom from thinking, I re-found simplistic joy: Puddle Jumping.

I became fascinated with everyone, including myself, zig-zagging across the side-walk to avoid the puddles. However, when I reached the old side of campus, I could no longer resist the urge to jump in.

The summer before freshman year of high school, my best friend Shannon and I were constantly walking into town to go to the dollar store. On the way back from one of our dollar store adventures, we found a very large puddle. Trying to splash Shannon, I jumped as high as I could with both feet hitting the puddle at the same time, creating an enormous splash. The rain water only misted Shannon; but, from the knees down, I was completely drenched.

I would have never guessed that almost five years later, the memory of jumping into a puddle to get my friend wet would have been useful. When confronted with a puddle that flooded an entire section of the sidewalk, I decided to figure out the specific science involved in puddle jumping. I found there are different techniques for bigger splashes, other techniques for controlling the direction of the splash, etc. The trick is, jumping in that puddle with one foot after the other, giving each foot enough room to cause a splash, the splash will be smaller, but it moves outwards instead of all over you. Depending on what part of your foot hits the ground first determines which way the splash will go–if your toe hits first, the splash will go forward; if the side of your left foot hits first, it will go to the left . . .

Thankfully, I have almost mastered this puddle jumping art. My jeans rarely get soaked to the knees anymore, but I can’t say the same for my blue converse shoes.

Now that I am reaching college graduation and the end of my dependance on my family, in order to create my own, I am afraid that one day I will completely forget about puddle jumping. I’m afraid to become an adult: to be responsible for not only my life but also the life of another, to pay attention to detail, to act first and play later. I’m afraid that when I reach adulthood I will lose myself as a sacrifice for a husband and child. I don’t want to lose the simplicity and spontaneity of thinking.

Since I moved away from Springfield, I have only gone puddle jumping once.

“Tabatha?” my friend Via asked, “What was your favorite moment of being 19?”

“Hmmm . . . that’s a hard one . . . well, I have a lot favorite moments. Like the time my roommate, Christie, and I rolled around in hampers together and created Hamper Olympics. Or playing intense games of Monopoly until three in the morning.” I lingered in these memories for a moment, reliving the happiness. Christie and I rolling around on the floor of our room in our mesh hampers, hers red, mine blue, seeing how many rolls we could make before getting dizzy. Playing Monopoly in TwoSouth with Kevin, Sarah, Matt, Aaron, and Colin, instead of doing our BioChem lab for the next day. After those few seconds, I continued,“But, I think my favorite memory was when I created Puddle Jumping.”

Via and I sat for a few moments, watching the rain fall outside.

“Wanna go puddle jumping?” I asked.

Via looked outside again, then looked back at me, “Well, it’s your birthday....”

So Via and I ran to the porch, and after a moment of hesitation, grabbed hands and ran into the torrential downpour. In seconds we were soaked.

We played in the rain: screaming, running, jumping, dancing, laughing, and spinning. We laid down on the wet cement and watched the rain drops fall, occasionally, getting a drop in the eye. Eventually, we got up again and started jumping in the puddles. Via and I were true puddle jumpers in those twenty minutes, we ran without thinking, or planning. We channeled a child’s spontaneous play. As we laid on the cement looking towards the sky, no one spoke. We breathed in the moment. The cars passing us by probably thought we were nuts, but I didn’t notice.

After about twenty minutes, the rain started to calm and we ran back to the porch and into the light. Via looked like she had just taken a shower with her clothes on, hair plastered to her face, mascara smearing around her eyes, clothes darkened and heavy, face dripping with water; I’m sure I looked the same. As we walked into the doorway, the simple joy we got from running in the rain ended as we hit the sixty-five degree air-conditioning. We were immediately brought back to reality and started to shiver. We realized we had nothing to change into, we didn’t even have a towel to dry off with.

When I finally arrived at the photography building, I didn’t even know who Via was, I didn’t even know I was going to leave Springfield, I didn’t know I would be continuing Puddle Jumping beyond that walk to class. The only things I knew was the rain has slowed, the Wicked Witch of the West was an older women in my photography class, she was in no danger of melting in the rain, my shoes and the bottom of my pants were soaked, my class was three and a half hours long, and I was smiling.

Mr. Ed's Horse

Mr. Ed’s Horse

“And don’t eat in my car either,” she said, finishing her list of commands and looking at me with the same scolding eyes my mother gave me the night before when I broke a plate after dinner.

I rarely drive to school with my older sister Stephanie, partially because she is always late, and partly because whenever I did, it felt like a punishment. But I missed the bus this morning and she is my only ride.

Attempting to avoid more of Stephanie’s car rules, I walk out of the kitchen and begin towards the garage; as I walk passed my mother’s beloved horse lamp and collection of Kentucky Derby glasses, I am reminded of Mr. Ed.

Before high school, Stephanie and I spent every day scheming and creating together; using each other as compensation for the lack of girls in our neighborhood. We lived on the outskirts of town, and because of that, there was only a small group for friend selection. Most of our neighbors had boys and the few girls were years older than us, making them too mature to play. So, Stephanie and I became each other’s best friend, riding our bikes around the neighborhood, making up stories as we peddled and torturing our bikes as we slammed them to the ground when we reached each destination. Eventually, the force of falling to the concrete turned the metal seats inward.

On a day we would usually ride aimlessly around the neighborhood, my mother reminded Stephanie and me about the Girl Scout cookies we had to sell. Stephanie and I desperately desired a cookie badge and the wind jacket we could win if we sold more than 100 cookie boxes. We went to each neighbor’s house trying to sell as many cookies as possible. Toward the end of our sales adventure, Stephanie and I came to Mr. Ed’s ranch style property. A line of trees and bushes hid most of the property from the road. As Stephanie and I sat on the crack between his driveway and the street, an old brick driveway, a large stone mailbox, and a flat brown roof were the only visible signs of a house. We were afraid, but with the allure of the cookie badge dangling in the back of our minds, we pedaled forward.

Reaching Mr. Ed’s house and slamming our pink and purple bikes on the faded red brick, Stephanie and I argued over who would get to claim the sale. When we looked up we saw that Mr. Ed’s house had two doors. We decided that the one at the right was attached to the garage, and the one to the left went to the house, both connected by a canopy of roof and a wall of windows. The porch was weathered and a film of dirt covered the windows at the front of the house.

When we stood before the thick wooden door, I reached up and lifted the brass door knocker, bashing it against the metal circle on the door. The brass handle bounced off with a thud and hit the door, with less force, for a second time.

Hearing the footsteps of our potential customer, Stephanie and I inched closer to the door. It opened exposing the largest man I had ever seen, introducing us first to his stomach. Stephanie and I backed up. I looked over at Stephanie and guessed from her smile she was thinking the same thing I was: I bet he eats a lot of cookies.

“Hello girls, what can I help you with today,” he said looking down at us in a gentle and joyful voice.

“Hi. I’m Stephanie, and this is my sister, Teal, and we’re Girl Scouts,” Stephanie started in our usual act.

“We would like to know if you want to buy some cookies,” I continued holding up the ordering form and a pen. When he took them both from my hand and paused, looking at the variety of cookies, I noticed his hands were as big as my head and his fingers were as thick and hairy as my arm.

“Well, I will have to see what the missis thinks about this,” and bending over in a whispered voice he said, “she never bakes cookies anymore. She says I eat them all too quickly, so this may be my only shot at some real sugar!”

Laughing in the same sinister tone my Grandpa Harvey does when Grandma catches him sneaking cookies, he said, “Come on in, I’ll get my wife,” and he escorted us into the foyer. “Sherry? Come over here, we have some little visitors.”

The hallway we stepped into was only lit by a small lamp and the sun shinning in from dirt-covered windows. His house reminded me of a cave, with its dark stone floor, musky smell, and cold breeze. There were paintings and pictures of horses hanging on almost every wall and a majority of the furniture was wood.

A petite, fragile women with silver hair and deep brown eyes came into the hallway carrying a carrot and a knife.

“Oh, hello girls, what are your names?” she said in the sweet voice of a grandmother.

“I’m Teal, and this is Stephanie. We live down the block next to the Ullmarks,” I said, knowing that everyone has heard of or been victims of the Ullmark brothers.

“Yes, okay,” she said trying to sound polite. From the look on her face, we knew what she was thinking: Those boys are trouble.

“Yea, we don’t like them very much anymore. Last week we went over to their house and they were blowing up baby frogs with firecrackers, and the week before they took our cat, Kitty, and they dumped her in a garbage can full of water,” Stephanie stated.

“Oh that’s terrible! Was your cat okay?”

“Yea, she gave them a few good scratches!” I said smiling vengefully.

Mr. Ed laughed and handed the cookie order form to his wife and said, “These lovely young girls would like to know if you want to buy some Girl Scout Cookies.”

Placing the knife in the front pocket of her apron, she examined the order form and said, “Well, how could we say no to these two smiling girls!”

Mr. Ed gave Stephanie and me a wink and we followed him and his wife into the kitchen.

The kitchen took up half the first floor of the house and had a sliding glass door to the backyard, displaying the acres of field, a large building, and a white fence. Scanning the fenced area to see what animals they had, I felt Stephanie nudge me and point to the right side of the fence. Turing my head, I saw two beautiful brown horses. One had white down its nose and the other was a solid brown.

Mr. Ed and his wife must have seen Stephanie and I gawking at the horses because after choosing three or four types of cookies to buy, they suggested we go outside and feed them some carrots. As we walked out the glass door, Stephanie and I tried to contain our excitement, making sure we would not scare the horses away.

Mr. Ed’s wife took the carrot she was using for her stew and handed it to Stephanie and said, “I wish I had more carrots to let you girls feed them with, but I’m afraid I already put them in the stew pot.”

“That’s okay,” Stephanie said, “We can both give it to him.”

We chose the horse that was closest to the fence, the one that was all brown.

“What’s his name?” I asked, pointing to the white and brown horse.

“Well, her name is Belle and this big brown guy is her son, Scout,” Mr. Ed said. He made a clucking noise to call Scout closer to the fence.

“Okay, so when you feed Scout, place your hands between the cracks and hold the carrot at the tip; we don’t want him to take any fingers with that carrot!” Mr. Ed seriously joked.

When Scout was close enough to see the carrot, he moved a little faster. I placed my right hand on top of Stephanie’s and we popped it through the space in-between the fence posts. Scout bent over and took it from our hands.

“Oh! And sit in the backseat!” Stephanie shouted from the kitchen as I walked out the garage door.

I walked through the garage to Stephanie’s car. I opened the back door and sat behind the driver’s seat and slammed the door.

Stephanie came quickly after me, with her checkered backpack slung over her right shoulder and car keys in her hand.

“Steph, do you remember Mr. Ed?” I asked when she got into the car.

Starting the car, she looked at me through the rearview mirror.

“Yea, I do.”

She smiled and reversed.

sometimes you just jump

The house wasn't a fresh layer of white. The trees and bushes were overgrown. There were weeds growing out of the porch and continued through the garden. Charlie walked along side of the chipping paint and admired the vines growing under the first story window. Moving closer to the window, she pulled a sleeve of her blue sweater down and used it to dust off a thick layer of dirt that rested on the glass. Charlie dusted off just enough to peer in and get a better look at her future. The house was dark, dusty, and needed a lot of work. It was perfect. From her window, she saw the beginning of the leaf covered staircase yearning for her hands to clean them and awaiting familiarity with her feet and her favorite pair of shoes. The fireplace, perfectly placed to the right of the window, also thirsted for her attention. It hungered for new wood and the surrounding room thirsted for the fire's orange glow. She could barely see the bench below the window sill, but she heard its longing for her. The bench would soon have the chance to memorize her. She imagined herself cuddling with the bench's pillows while she read.

Soaking in the future memory, Allen called her name, distracting her from the warmth of the house.
"Charlie!...Charlie, you will never believe this! Get over here!"
Charlie ran to the back of the house where she saw Allen standing on a wooden swing tied to the oldest tree in the yard. He jumped off the tree and met Charlie by the back door of the house.
"Charlie", he said heavily, "this house, this yard, these trees, so incredible...".
He looked around at the trees surrounding the forgotten house, he smiled as he thought about his future with Charlie, "Were you scopin out your new garden?".
Charlie laughed, "Yea, its gunna to take a lot of work, but I love the wildness of that garden. It reminds me of yours!"
Allen pulled Charlie in and gave her a huge hug. Kissing her on the forehead, he grabbed her hand and dashed back to the swing, "Come here, you've gotta check this out...".




TO BE CONTINUED!....

Puddle Jumper 01

She always gets the best ideas in the rain, maybe its the sound the rain makes as it hits the hard cement, or maybe its because everything seems to be quieter outside. She was wearing a hooded sweatshirt, but she refused to place the hood on her head as she walked. She likes the feeling rain drops fall on her face, and the way the rain makes her hair curl up in different places--making the use of her straightener this morning simply a waste of energy.

She looked around as people passed her by on the side walk..."Everyone's walking so fast", she thought. Like if they don't get out of the rain, their fate will be similar to the Wicked Witch that Dorthy threw water on. "I'm melting, I'm melting". She laughed a little to herself as she imagined the tiny women who just sped past her on the sidewalk, clinging to her umbrella, as the Wicked Witch of the West. She wondered what it would be like to be Dorthy...she never did have that dang dog when she was little to complete the look.

The closest she got to Dorthy was a Little Red Ridinghood costume her mother bought her for Halloween when she was 5, she never took the costume off--even while running through the sprinkler in her swimming suit, she had the hood on--, demanding always to play in the costume...

It's funny how girls and boys have different heroes. Little girls admire the Disney princesses and figures like Dorthy or Little Red Ridinghood while boys like the Heros. She was a tomboy growing up. Playing football with the boys, climbing trees, making forts, playing in the dirt, getting scratches or bruises then examining and comparing them later. She loved every minute of hanging with the boys and making up games...but secretly she admired the Disney princesses. Belle was her favorite. Belle was the only princess who knew sacrifice...sure the other ones sacrificed things too...but thats usually what they were...things. No, Belle, she knew real sacrifice...to set her father free, she traded herself for him. And even after that she was able to help a man whose heart had grown cold to the world, melt his heart and teach him to love someone more than himself. Growing up she has grown to appreciate Belle for that. Belle shows that women too can be strong...but in the end, they still want romance and a stronger man to protect them and teach them....her thoughts were interrupted by a yell from a friend across the quad grass...she looked up and waved, watching her friend hide under his hood and into the library.
The rain was falling harder now, she looked up and saw the Wicked Witch of the West grasp the umbrella tighter. "Rain", she thought, "people act so different in the rain", she was then passed for the fifth time. Watching the people walk across the quad she noticed the almost robotic shifts in their path, following in the same footsteps as the person in front of them. She wondered if the way people walk in the rain is how people wish they could walk everyday...are we all avoiding the puddles?

She loved spring rain. Spring rain mean spring puddles. Last spring it rained so much the puddles remained days after the rain had stopped. The puddles were so big jumping in them became a game. Jumping in puddles has been transformed into an art. There is a specific science involved. If you jump right in with both feet...your shoes and jeans are going to be soaked! The trick is...jumping in that puddle with one foot after the other and giving each foot enough room to cause a splash. She has almost mastered this puddle jumping art, her jeans rarely get soaked to the knees anymore. She can't say the same for her converse shoes though, she never has been able to complete a puddle jumping adventure without getting them completely soaked.

When she arrived to the photography building she realized the Wicked Witch was the older women in her photography class and she was in no danger of melting in the rain. She greeted her classmate and ended her puddle jumping...that's when she realized her shoes and pants are soaking wet and her class is 3 1/2 hours long...

Purpose Statement

I created this blog as an outlet for my writing. I want this blog to be an outlet for creativity. I am hoping my ideas and thoughts matter to the reader...but if they don't, they matter to me. I want to be able to write freely and discuss whatever is on my mind...which means....*dun..dun...dun...*
You have now entered the mind of Tabatha....*women screams in the background, baby cries, and some guy yells..."oh crap...not that, anything but that!"*

Enjoy! :)