Saturday's Storyteller: The Swamp
The Swamp
by Belinda Roddie
Here in the swamp, we wade in the mud until all of the skin up to our knees is coated in green and brown and black. We dip our fingers into the bayou and feel the fishes and critters wriggles against our cuticles. Sometimes, we see the glittering beady eyes of alligators, their snouts protruding from the seemingly endless waters.
When we are done covering ourselves in mud, we then rinse off in the shower provided by our tiny lodge, and we settle for sweet potatoes and rice for lunch. My brother and I like to hitch a ride from Big Janice around three, and we drive all the way out to where the salt water is swallowing up islands that used to protrude from the shore like pearly kneecaps. She lets us eat shrimp sandwiches at the Old Man's Bucket before making us walk all the way home. She says it's good for us.
There aren't too many people who live where we live now. Papa's always told to move us out before the hurricanes get bad again - one more disaster, they all say, and our house would be the first to go. But he ignores it and settles for reading old books and chewing on tobacco, while my brother and I go back out to the swamp and count all the stars as they appear in the early, humid evening sky.
This week's prompt was provided by Arden Roddie.
by Belinda Roddie
Here in the swamp, we wade in the mud until all of the skin up to our knees is coated in green and brown and black. We dip our fingers into the bayou and feel the fishes and critters wriggles against our cuticles. Sometimes, we see the glittering beady eyes of alligators, their snouts protruding from the seemingly endless waters.
When we are done covering ourselves in mud, we then rinse off in the shower provided by our tiny lodge, and we settle for sweet potatoes and rice for lunch. My brother and I like to hitch a ride from Big Janice around three, and we drive all the way out to where the salt water is swallowing up islands that used to protrude from the shore like pearly kneecaps. She lets us eat shrimp sandwiches at the Old Man's Bucket before making us walk all the way home. She says it's good for us.
There aren't too many people who live where we live now. Papa's always told to move us out before the hurricanes get bad again - one more disaster, they all say, and our house would be the first to go. But he ignores it and settles for reading old books and chewing on tobacco, while my brother and I go back out to the swamp and count all the stars as they appear in the early, humid evening sky.
This week's prompt was provided by Arden Roddie.
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