She chased lightning bugs on hot summery nights in Kansas with her brother...
Even with my hair stuck to my face, and dirt covered hands and knees I didn't care, these were the times of adventure...dirt was normal clothing for me back then.
My brother and I would take an old mayonase jar, wash it out and poke holes in the top with a hammer and rusty nail.
"Why do you put grass and sticks in the jar?" Mark asks me
"So they don't feel so bad about being caught"
Mark looks at me as if I am a silly, but being my brother he "gets me"
I always hated the way the jar smelled. You could wash it and wash it, but it still smelled like mayo...
The sun was finnally almost down and we were on an old blanket in the grass..waiting...waiting..waiting... for them to come out and play...
the crickets chirping got louder and louder as to announce the arrivial of our guests.
Sure enough...the faint blinking of little lights began.
Mark and I looked at each other, smiled and ran. It was always a contest who could capture the most lightning bugs.
He always let me hold the jar because he knew I hated trying to catch them with my hands.
After we got around 5 or so we would watch them blink in the jar..not quite knowing what we would do with them now. .
We took a walk, making it down the road to a small church surrounded by honeysuckle.
Looking in the jar, Mark and I enjoyed our new treasure, and started making up magical powers that the bugs held.
"What if they gave us three wishes like a geenie, and we could have lots and lots of money" I said..
Mark answered "What if they could fly us away to anyplace in the world"...
And we lay on the church steps dreaming about what life would be like if...what if..
Now the stars were out, and the heat was starting to cool, and a breeze was starting to blow.
Time to go home.....
So we took the lid off the jar...
somehow we knew if we let the Fireflys go ..our wishes would be heard and answered...
they flew out one by one, and we watched them go.
Ahh childhood.
I miss it today..Mark ended up in tha airforce and has been all over the world..he did get his wish...now where is my lotto money?? Hehehehe.
From the mind of the Almighty Heidi and her adventures with her brother "Captain Markle"
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9 comments:
lovely......we don't have firefly's here....but we do have childhood's.....
this is so sweet! and you're right, you gotta let them go again...
Lovely blog award for you on http://pushbuttonalpha.blogspot.com :)
ooOOOOooo Alpha..Iv'e never gotten an award before..I feel like a kid at Christmas:o) Gidddy!!
I will accept it on my next blog entry, thank you so much!!
What a great blog! I look forward to reading more.
i loved this.
i was there.
i could feel the heat cooling
and the nite darkening....
thanks for sharin'.....
Perhaps all of these tales of your childhood could be linked into a grander telling. I've noticed a theme in a lot of your memories... Many of them are similar to things that most of us experience at some point in our lives. Who hasn't caught fireflies or put on a cape to become a super hero? What makes your stories uniue is the element of YOU and how you perceived the experience. I suggest you title it "Passage Rites". All of these things lend to our growth, albeit serrendipitously, until we re-examine and re-experience the events retrospectively.
My two cents :)
As always, worth at LEAST a quarter!
AWESOME-
J
You remembered.
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