Flight of the Bees
I don’t know what is wrong with me this evening. I’m suddenly thinking of things from my past in rapid succession. It is almost as if there is an 8-track player in my brain. I think of something for a few minutes, then CLICK- on to the next one. This one was an event that took no longer than ten minutes when I was in first grade.
As many of you know, my family lived in four locations during our four years in England. First, we lived in the basement of an old castle. Then we moved to a farm and lived in half of the huge farmhouse. From there, we moved to Lakenheath village and lived in a row house on a lane by the river. Our next stop was Lakenheath Air Force Base to live in a tiny one bedroom trailer. That was the year I started first grade.
My sister, Patti, and I had lots of friends on Lakenheath. We all went to the same school, of course. Plus, American kids tend to seek out others in base housing. But one little girl, Cheryl Wall, was English. I suppose that, since it was an English Air Force Base, they might have had English families mixed in with the Americans. Either that, or the housing Cheryl lived in with her grandmother, whom we called Granny Wall, was right next to ours.
Anyway, one day, Patti, Cheryl, and I were walking to the playground. Suddenly we heard a loud buzzing noise. Before we had time to react, a swarm of bees was flying just over our heads. We were all terrified and stood frozen in place waiting to be stung to pieces. Cheryl was so frightened that she actually peed. It was a bit surreal with all the buzzing, the fear, and the stream of steaming liquid pouring from Cheryl.
Before we knew it, the bees had all flown away to wherever they were headed. None of us were stung, but Cheryl started bawling uncontrollably. Patti and I each held an arm , and , in full displays of sympathy, walked her back to her home.
Funny. It took longer to write than the incident itself. I’ve been sitting here trying to think of what made me think of it. (Oh, that’s a silly sentence.) My guess is that my brain made some kind of connection to the last story involving a trailer and a person named Cheryl. Scary… Right?