MY PATH TO THE BATHROOM AS A LITTLE GIRL

MY PATH TO THE BATHROOM AS A LITTLE GIRL...

I walked into the kitchen. I hated to go to the bathroom at Grandma and George's, but, of course I had no choice. At nighttime, it was scary to open that big, brown door to the back porch! I was a little girl in a new place, sometimes it was very scary.

I went to the door and pushed the little lock back to unlock it. I opened the door ever so easy so, as not to make 'anything notice me'! I was afraid... I turned the porch light on. I left that door opened to a crack... I waited as I peeped out....

I looked toward the screen door and saw that it was hooked. The back porch was screened in. There was wood stacked in a neat pile to my left. This was where George would put the wood when he chopped it. I was always fascinated watching George... he was blind but, he knew where he was going, he did everything from cooking, washing and trying to make the house clean. George was a good man.

I tried to help in my little girl way. My other cousins when they lived there would do just as I did. We were children, but, did the best we could. All of us children who came to stay, to leave, to come back to Grandma Alma and George's .. had to learn to survive. We all went through things children should never know. Grandma Alma and George did the very best they could do. She was paralyzed, he was blind.

I was a little girl learning to be afraid of all kinds of things since coming to Grandma Alma and George's. I saw things there I'd never seen, nor had been around. I couldn't understand why I didn't have my own home anymore. Everything I did here was scary and it seemed things wanted to get me!

Things would fall on me when I would open the cabinet doors to get a glass to get water with... brown bugs with legs! I would begin shaking all over and my chest felt so tight, I would feel faint. I would knock them off from me, while jumping up and down. I would begin crying, I was so afraid of those bugs. They would sometimes fall onto my head, and I would scream while bending over to knock them off my head.

The door to the back porch was beside that cabinet with the glass doors. Opening that door took alot of nerve... plus, 'having to go' to the bathroom ..I would have no choice. Picture a little girl, eyes wide with fear, peeping through the crack before fully opening the door. I peeped to make sure nothing was on the porch to get me!

I 'had to go', I stood there standing with my legs tight together. I had to go bad! The coast looked clear! All I had to do was to open the back door now, and go just alittle way and open the wooden door on my left to the bathroom.

I quietly opened the door, stood there very alert. I tiptoed just a short distance and I heard something! It was coming from above me, up on that dark, old wardrobe! Oh no!

I turned to run back into the door, before I could ... something big jumped almost on my head! I screamed and ran into the door, slamming, locking it behind me. I was crying.

I heard George and Grandma Alma wondering what was wrong with Faye. George told her he would go see, I could hear his feet shuffling.

"Faye, Faye", he called my name. "What's wrong, Faye?" He came into the kitchen holding onto the doorway he'd just entered. He was looking toward me, though he couldn't see.

"George, please help me!" I was crying in frustration because I had to go! "Please stand here so, I can go to the bathroom!" I told him something big tried to jump on me!

Grandma Alma's voice was behind him, she sat in her recliner in the next room. She wanted to know what was wrong. George told her he thought a big wharf rat had jumped from that wardrobe, and almost landed on Faye!

I saw George's kind face, even his sightless eyes ... begin to smile. He felt for me, and he told me to let him open that back door, for me to go to the bathroom. He said he'd stand there and protect me.

He opened the door, the porch light was still on... I leaned my head so, I could look past George.... I didn't see anything. "Go on to the bathroom, Faye".

I ran the short distance to the bathroom, opened the door, turned on the light and oh my God! There it was again!

I began screaming for George to help me! "George, it's there again!"

"What in the Sam hell is in there, Faye?" George was beginning to lose patience with me, and his voice was raising.

I was frozen in fear as I stared at that fat, pink thing with legs... it's little belly was the color of my skin. It was looking at me! It looked like a pink, fat grasshopper! "George, it's a kididdlehopper! It's going to jump on me, help me, George!"

"___dammit, Faye!" George hollered. He was ill at me now! "That damn thing's not going to hurt you!" George told me to tell him where it was, and to move out of his way. I told him and he leaned down, took his hand and waved it in the direction of that kididdlehopper!

That kididdlehopper jumped toward George! I screamed and jumped back, George jumped, and bumped his head on the bathroom sink. George was good and mad now! ___dammit! George was going to holler now!

I couldn't see where that kididdlehopper went! I became fascinated watching George! George amazed me... when he got mad. His voice could get so loud, and his eyes would seem to bulge out of his head. He was like a big loud clap of thunder! Yes, that George could get mad!

"George, I got to pee!" I said in a little voice. "I got to pee bad!" How George heard me as loud as he was hollering, I'll never know, but... he did! "Get in here and pee now!"

I carefully went in, watching for that kididdlehopper. I pulled my panties down and got up on that tobacca-stained commode. When I finished, I hopped off the commode right onto........................

You could hear me screaming for miles... as I scrambled to get out of that bathroom! George was thundering with his voice, I was running like lightening. It was indeed a storm in that bathroom!

I made it out of the bathroom, my little panties around my ankles! I tripped on them, naked butt in the air! I was down on the cement porch, I knew that wharf rat was there somewhere! I was jumping up to get back to the safety on the other side of that backdoor!

Cold chills were all over my body, I was shaking and felt sick. That pink kididdlehopper had been there on the floor looking up at me when I almost put my foot on it! I ran to my Grandma Alma and she held her good hand out to hug me. She held me to her chest, my grandma cared so much.

George came back into the sitting room (I named it the Arena). He sat down in his wooden chair with a caned bottom in it. He always sat beside Grandma Alma's recliner.

I heard George making a funny sound and looked over at him... his face had broken out into a big grin... I heard and saw laughter begin to come from him! George had a big Santa Claus belly... it began moving up and down, and George laughed so hard! He couldn't speak, though he tried. It was fun to see George's happy belly begin moving as he laughed.

My grandma looked at him, she too, began laughing! I stood up and looked at both of them... I couldn't believe they were laughing! I'd just been fighting for my life, survived two battles with a giant rat that tried to jump on me, and one of those dreaded kadiddlehoppers that scared me everytime I saw one!

Their laughter was contagious... I began to laugh. Just watching their faces with that happy expression on them made me want to laugh, too. I forgot about fighting for my life, and watched my grandma's and George's laughing faces! How I loved Grandma Alma and George, especially when they laughed. They didn't laugh all the time...

Note by this author: To this day I still have the heebie-jeebies when I see a pink kadiddlehopper! I just can't take it! I can feel so weak and I feel like I can hardly breathe... but, I take a stand. Either it's got to go... or I got to go! I wish I knew the real name of these grasshopper-like creatures... to me, they look like little people with pink, fat stomaches. You wouldn't believe the countless battles I've been in with these creatures through the years... I always dread to see one!

ANOTHER NOTE BY THIS AUTHOR:  MY FRIEND, BRETT, SENT ME A LINK TO TELL ME THE NAME OF THE 'KADIDDLEHOPPERS'........  THEY ARE CALLED 'KATYDIDS'.  JUST LOOK FOR THE ONE WITH THE FATTEST, PINK BELLY AND INTELLIGENT EYES!  THAT'S THE ONE!  BELOW IS THE LINK:
https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=African+flower+mantid&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=425l425l0l2278l1l1l0l0l0l0l89l89l1l1l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=909&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=JNUuT9SBEKrc0QGnnZj3Cg#q=pink+katydid&um=1&hl=en&tbm=isch&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=b55e1a54242e9b95&biw=1184&bih=594