I am under few delusions about the grace of children, the pure, true blank slates of their natures.  Children over about three, in groups together, can turn into little beasts, The Lord of the Flies a perfectly reasonable story about what children might be like alone without the mitigating punishments and time outs and heart-to-heart talks with adults, adults who have learned to make their own evil, selfish thoughts and actions covert, stealthy.

One Fourth of July, back about 1973 or 1974, I was at the public swimming pool my parents had joined when I was very small.  It was the pool I'd learned to swim in; it was the place I spent hours at each day.  We had swim team and then we stayed to play--later, we stayed to sit out in the sun.  Later still, I worked there, teaching lessons and life guarding.  But in 1973, I was in the kid mode, about 12, and it was the 4th, a day of races and contests.

The last contest was the money dive--the lifeguards would throw in a few dollars worth of change into the pool, and we would swim around looking for it.  But before that grand finale, was the greased watermelon contest.  A lifeguard would swim a watermelon covered in Vaseline out to the middle of the pool and then from either end we would swim like mad to the watermelon and try to grab it and take it out of the pool.  It's harder than you might think.

All my friends and I decided to do it--all my friends and one girl we didn't like.  An older girl, a slightly weird older girl we made fun of, we little shits.

So one of my friends said, "Let's pretend we are trying to keep it away from each other, but all we should do is keep it away from "Ann."

We all agreed.

So we split up, half at one end of the pool, half at the other, and when the lifeguard blew the whistle, we swam like demons toward the watermelon.  "Ann" came on fast and furious.  She was all arms and legs.  She had big hands, and she grabbed that watermelon and it slipped under her arms, back up to the surface.  One of my friends grabbed it and it slipped from her.  "Ann" was back at it, grabbing with those giant mitts.  the watermelon bobbed back up.  She grabbed at it again, lunging at it, her whole body focused.

We became incensed, this ugly group mind.  We grabbed, we screamed.

One of us grabbed the watermelon.  It might have even have been me.  I swam like a maniac to the shore.  It was ours.

All of us cheered, and we took the watermelon to the picnic area and ate it, not inviting "Ann" to have any.

No adult likely noticed what we were doing.  But "Ann" did, and I have felt sorry for my little part in the ugly watermelon race of 1973 since about 1975.  For a couple of summers, it was "The Time We Got the Watermelon Away from Ann."

But then it turned into, "The What Was Wrong With Us Watermelon Incident."

So today, when I eat a piece of watermelon--and I know i will--I am going to think of "Ann" and hope she has a big old slice for herself.  A whole watermelon for herself that she doesn't have to share with anyone.

Jessica