Pete and Adele
I don’t remember ever being too hot to play outside, or too tired to run all the way home from a friend’s house and then jumping that ditch in the nick of time. I had to jump that ditch. That ditch had things in it that crawled and had legs with claws. Turns out they were crawdads. I think some people call them crawfish. Nevertheless, I thought they were just about the scariest things I had ever seen and ever hoped to see in the future.
That ditch was to be avoided at all costs, which took a little doing since it ran all the way across the front of our house and it rained a lot in our area. Heavy rains brought that ditch even closer to the house. I know because I watched it. Our front yard did have a place of great safety…..the swing hanging under the giant oak tree. If I could get to it during high tide without encountering one of those crawling things, I would jump onto it and look down at the water with a smug sense of security.
Some people said that Pete was a rat terrier. That seemed OK to me. I figured that the name had something to do with his size, until someone else told me that rat terriers are very, very good at finding rat holes and digging out the occupant. Good grief! Not my dog! I forgot Pete’s calling in life until the day my Daddy said that the neighbors down the road from us wanted to borrow Pete to help get rid of some rats in their barnyard. That was almost more than I could stand, so I went in the house and hid. Of course no one was looking for me, but for some reason it was comforting to hide.
Quite a while had passed as I huddled in the dirty clothes hamper, in the dark, when suddenly I heard a dog’s yelping coming closer and closer.
I ran out in the yard just in time to see Pete arrive back on our property and run under the house. Obviously, he also found it comforting to hide. Later Daddy told me that Pete had found the rats, got a good look, then ran for home. So much for names.
To read earlier blogs about Pete and me, go here:
See you next time,
Letters From Adele 
Hiding in the hamper – ummm, that even sounds cozy and safe! 🙂
Alison, I must have thought it was cozy and safe. A friend sent a photo of her two sons as toddlers, peeking out of their clothes hamper. Fun.
I, too, have a history with crawfish and ditches! My brother and I liked to catch “crawdads” in the ditch across the street with tiny pieces of bacon on a string. We’d put them in a coffee can and eventually let them go…I never touched them, of course. This is why I’ve never eaten “swamp bugs,” as some people call them! I can’t stand the idea of eating them. But it was great fun to fish for them in the ditches…I love reading your stories and can’t wait for the next one! 🙂
Thanks, Becky. I’m glad you like my stories…crawdads and all.
Cute story, Adele! My brother and I played outside all of the time and I remember those scary looking crawdads, too!!!
Those were good times….but there were the scary things, crawdads, snakes, spiders…etc. But playing outside was worth the risk.
Our house in Bear Branch backed onto drainage ditch and reason my boys are healthy is because I let them play in it. Indeed they found all kind of things to put in a bucket and bring home . I have a picture of them in clothes hamper just like your drawing.
Kathy, Thanks for sending the photo of your two boys playing in the clothes hamper. They must have thought it was a great place, too. By the way, part of my “A Country Girl” short story is about me and my friends playing in the drainage ditch a few pastures away from our house. What a coincidence!
You have an amazing memory! Love your stories, Adele! And, yes, David, you are both blessed!
I feel truly blessed to be the one entrusted with the privilege of loving and caring for this wonderful girl for almost 63 years; it has been an amazing journey!
Yes, I’m blessed beyond words to have David as my husband. Love him dearly.
Oh my goodness, that’s hysterically funny. I loved the drawing of you hiding; that really made me chuckle. Good old Pete, he was smart and ran home.
Love you
Yes, Karen, I think Pete was very smart…especially when it came to rats.