That’s what you get

Nothing beats Six Nations in the spring. When I was a kid it was always exciting the first time you got to play outside without your winter coat on. My little sister Laura and I would go racing back the bush, hair blowing in the wind trying to be the first one down to the crick. 

If I stop and think hard enough I can almost hear the birds singing and the trickle and flow of the water passing me by. I could sit for hours in the warm sunshine down by the crick. There was a big log that went across it. I would walk back and forth over that log, singing songs and imagining I was a circus star. Inevitably that fun would be interrupted. Usually it was because my little sister was trying to follow me but got stuck in the mud.
“HELP ME! I’m stuuuck….” she would cry.

“Ha, ha that’s what you get” I’d tease her. Then I’d start walking away like I was just gonna leave her there all alone. That is when she’d start screaming because she thought she would be stuck there forever.
“Heckinit, quit being a little Jih’dawihs. You’ll be fine,” I would shout back at her, still walking away.

“I’m gonna tell! MOOOOM!” she would scream. And I don’t mean shout. My little sister could cry bloody murder. Because we lived on top of a hill you could hear her screaming halfway down the concession.
“Alright!” I shouted. “I was just kidding, holay!”

I’d go walk myself into the slurpy mud and help to try and release her boots. She’d be crying there all red faced and snotty because I teased her too long. As soon as I got close enough she’d leach onto me for dear life and I’d pick her right up out of her boots and lift her to safety setting her down on the grass. Sometimes I could rescue the boots, sometimes they’d sit there stuck in the mud until my dad got home.

Of course we didn’t have the mind to go get her other shoes. We were too excited to play. Instead we’d just run around getting her socks all muddy tearing up the backyard because it was spring. After a while we’d get called inside for lunch; that meant tomato soup, grilled cheese and Fred Penner or the Flintstones.

We’d race up to the house to be the first one in. Because every kid knows that whoever is first is best.

“What did you do to your socks?” my mom would shout. My little sister could turn on the tears in an instant. This came in handy that day as she told my mother the harrowing tale of being trapped in the mud and how I left her there to suffer.

“Nahnda you march right outside this minute and get her boots: right now!” mom shouted at me.

Laura looked at me and smiled, wiping away her tears. I glared at her. Still smiling she peeled off her muddy socks, flopped them down in front of me and sauntered inside to her soup with her nose in the air.
“Come on! Go get those boots.” my mom would scold me.

Defeated by my younger and wiser sister, I did a full on tantrum walk to the mud to yank out her boots. I suppose that’s what I get.

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