(My mother's nickname was Cha--rhymes with chat. The following is a true story.)
“Wake
up, Cha, let’s hurry so we can beat the others to the river. For
once let’s be first.”
Ten-year-old Cha Kennedy
slowly opened her eyes and looked at her older sister.
“It’s
morning already?” she asked. Then she remembered how she wanted to
be the first to jump in and swim across the Chikaskia River to a
sandbar on the other side.
During the ride yesterday
from their home in Blackwell she had overheard her parents talking
about the spring rains and how they hoped that the river hadn’t
flooded. The family had arrived very late last night at Camp Phelps
Grove in northern Oklahoma and had not had a chance to check out the
river that ran in front of the cabins.
Springing into action,
Cha, accompanied by her older sister and little brother who was also
awake, crept out of the cabin with eager anticipation. Their parents
and little sister were still asleep. Once outside they saw that some
of the other vacationing kids had beaten them to the bank and were
staring anxiously at the water. Cha had a sinking feeling when she
saw how worried they looked. After all, none of them had jumped in
yet.
As
soon as the other kids saw Cha they began to challenge her to be the
first one to take the plunge. She wondered why they were picking on
her. They
should remember I’m not a good swimmer.
“Come
on, Cha, you go first.”
“Yeah,
see if you can make it across.”
Cha looked at the river
and saw why they had hesitated. The river was higher than normal and
the racing current visible on the surface was quite intimidating.
The kids continued to egg
her on and she was tempted to jump in. Could she make it across? The
others seemed to think she could--or were they just goading her?
As the taunting increased
she gave in and decided she could at least try. Surely the river
wasn’t so bad. She had swum in the Chikaskia many times before. She
plunged into the rapidly moving water—and was immediately swept
away.
Overcome with panic, she
began to scream. “Help! Help!” She gulped and sputtered as the
water washed over and around her, pulling and tugging her further and
further away from the shore.
The other kids began to
scream too as they ran along the riverbank following her. At least
one had the presence of mind to go for help.
“Mr.
Kennedy! Help! Cha can’t make it to the other side of the river!
She’s caught in the current—help!”
Cha’s father
immediately stepped out of the cabin, surveyed the scene, pulled off
his shoes and jumped into the river. To Cha’s great relief he was
soon beside her. But to her distress he didn’t grab her and haul
her back to shore. Instead, he swam alongside her, firmly urging her
to swim onward.
She couldn’t believe
that he wasn’t helping her. Was he just going to let her drown?
“Come
on, you can do it,” he repeated over and over.
Disappointed and angry,
she had no other choice. She continued with all her strength and swam
downriver with her father beside her.
Despite
the pull of the rushing water, Cha, impelled by her father’s stern,
“You can do it,” struggled to reach the shore. She kicked her
legs and moved her arms furiously over and under, over and under,
with her father swimming alongside her continuously pushing her with
his words. “You
can do it! You can do it!”
She
wanted so much for him to grab her and hold her as he swam to the
shore but he refused. You
can do it! You can do it! The
words became an echo inside her head as she frantically propelled her
body onward through the water. All at once she knew she could do
it—she had to.
And she did it—she
reached the shore by herself. But she was still angry with her father
for not helping her more. Standing up, she shook the water off and
looked around, ready to complain to him. They had swum quite a
distance downstream but they were safe. Suddenly she smiled, no
longer quite so angry with her father who, she realized, should have
been angry with her for so carelessly endangering herself.
However, as he waded onto
the shore he said simply yet sternly, “I knew you could do it.”
Grateful
that he had not reprimanded her more, she thought to herself, I
did it but I’ll never do it again. By
the look on his face she could tell that he knew she had learned her
lesson.
No one else went in the
river that day.
