kids are dumb

They are also bluntly honest and cruel, but we're just gonna focus on the dumb part today.

As I was saying, kids are dumb. I know I sure did my fair share of pretty dumb things as a kid like washing rocks with soap and a toothbrush in my mom's sink, starting a small brush fire in the neighbors back yard and bending over anywhere in the general vicinity of my bother-in-law's yellow lab (Dumbest. Dog. Ever. We're talking about the same intelligence level as dirt. Maybe celery).

Anyway, the following is a narrative of a fun game that my childhood best friend Lucky-Unlucky and I used to play in her back yard. Fun, sure, but as you will see, obviously a little too much of a challenge for our cognitive abilities.

As children Lucky and I spent a good chunk of our time in her backyard being tomboys, as I have mentioned in a prior post. We built things, we drowned things, we got all kinds of dirty. You know, the usual stuff. In her back yard was a walnut tree with a rope swing. Now being the imaginative little kids that we were, we got out benches and put them a short distance away from each other with the rope hanging in between in the interest of swinging back and forth. See, cool right?

So that worked well but it lost its appeal rather quickly. So we decided to do an old standby game. The 'you make up a cool swing and we'll both do it and then I will make up one... etc etc'. So we had Superman Swings and Tarzan swings but soon we had to be a bit more inventive. I decided to make up the "Dead Man's Swing". I got the rope and pulled up the end and held it together in a loop. I then put my head in the loop and swung across the benches holding above my head so the rope was slack. While I did it I made some gurgling sound and we both laughed and thought it was all good fun.

Then it was Lucky's turn,

She got her rope ready and pushed off the bench. She never quite made it to the other side. She lost all momentum and just sort of swung lazily in the middle all the while choking and sputtering. I mean this girl was good!! Her legs were all kicking and jerking and her face was turning red. It was awesome. I laughed and laughed!

It wasn't till she finally realized that all she had to do is let go of the rope above her head that I found out that she hadn't been acting---she hadn't quite gotten the gist of the whole 'hold the rope' thing and had actually been there choking to death on her own accord.

Boy was she pissed.

See. Kids are dumb.