I have a cousin who writes a column for her hometown newspaper.
I try to remember to read it every week, sometimes I even leave a
comment. Her column this week had to do with the weather and summer's
heat in particular. As her column was winding down she happened to
mention how as kids they would try to put ice cubes down each other's backs.
Boy, did that
bring back memories. Yep, we used to do that too. In summer after our dinner meal was over, dad would retire to his chair in
the corner of the room and bury his nose in his newspaper while the rest of us
would sit around the table and play a game we called "hid the salt
shaker"-or whatever article a person chose to hide. The object of the game was we would have to
guess which article was gone from the table. Sometimes someone got really
tricky and it took a while to actually find what was missing. We spent
hours playing this game; of course not all at one time because we eventually
had to clear the table and do the dishes.
However, during
summer mom frequently prepared iced tea for dinner and our “Hide the Salt Shaker” game frequently ended when someone would
pretend to take one last sip of their iced tea, slip an ice cube into their
hand; nonchalantly rise, walk behind a person and drop the cube down their shirt
then...dash...for the nearest exit. Said victim then chased the perpetrator
round and round the house in an attempt to put an ice cube down their shirt. Generally the 'perp' was never caught. I remember once in my haste
to catch my 'perp' I got my ring caught in the screen door handle which bent
the ring and bruised my finger very badly. Such was life.
It was great how
we could find fun things to do that didn't cost any money yet filled us with
hours of entertainment. We played cards and games on the porch and hide
and seek in the yard. At dusk we caught fire-flies in jars and waved
sparklers around when it got dark.
Oh, yes, like my
cousin said in her article, we too sweltered in the heat at bedtime and prayed
for a breeze or ever better an electrical storm that would drop the temperature
a good ten degrees, but that's not really what I remember about summer.
There were afternoon's lying on a blanket in the back yard in a bathing
suit slathered in baby oil, sprinkling ourselves with salt water (okay it wasn't
the ocean) we could dream couldn't we? There was hanging laundry in the early
morning and retrieving it warm, dry and smelling delicious in the late
afternoon. There was the smell of freshly mown grass, and the joy of
watching grasshoppers leap out of the way of the mower. And, last but not
least there was the fun of being the perpetrator when it came to slipping an
ice cube down a sibling's shirt.
