The Bottomless Ditch

March 17, 2010, 12:18:43 AM

When my brother (who is 2 years older than I am) and I were still in Grade School, there was a day during Christmas break that we spent at our Uncle and Aunt's house. The game plan was, we would spend the day there and when Mom and Dad got off work, they'd pick us up on the way home. Sounds innocent enough, doesn't it? Well, keep on reading!

Joining Charles and me at their house that day, was our Cousin Sue. Sue was younger than we were back then, and as far as I know, she's still younger than we are today. Sue has a little brother named Craig that was supposed to join us at our Aunt and Uncle's house late that afternoon. Craig had some kind of school function he had to go to that day and was supposed to ride a school bus to a stop that was close to our Aunt and Uncle's house. To help out, Charles, Sue and I were supposed to walk to the school bus stop and wait there for Craig to get off, so we could bring him back with us.

Right before Charles, Sue and I were going to head out to Craig's bus stop, the phone rang. My Aunt told us to wait, because it was someone from Craig's school. When she got off the phone, she explained to us that Craig had missed his bus and was still at the school. The school wasn't too far from where my Aunt and Uncle lived, so they asked Charles if he'd feel comfortable leading Sue and me to the school to pick Craig up so we could bring him back with us. He said "sure" and the next thing we all new, we were on our way.

Now mind you; it was close to Christmas and the Hawk was out that day! Not only was the wind whipping pretty good, it was COLD too! It was in the 20's. Since Charles was the oldest, Sue and I were put in his charge.

Everything was going fine and it really wasn't any different than any other stroll I had taken in my life up to that point in my life until we came across the bottomless ditch. Ah yes. The bottomless ditch. To this day, I can still send a shiver up Charles' spine with just a mention of it.

We had been walking long enough to be about half-way to the school when we came to a point in our journey where we encountered a big, water-swollen ditch that was so full of water, you either had to walk out onto a busy street to skirt it, or hang on to a chain link fence and do a tight rope walk to get past. Charles knew that under no cirspoogestances would it have been acceptable for us to set one foot on a busy street like that, so he chose the latter option. Charles looked at the situation and said "Vic, go on! You're going first!" When I pointed out that there was only inches of ground at the base of the fence that wasn't under water and that I wasn't sure about doing that, he started laying into me pretty good. "Well, we can't turn around now! We can't go out in the street! This is the only way, now GO!"

Well, even though I didn't want to do it, I decided to take a stab at it. Even though Charles is only 2 years older than I am, he used to serve not only the role of a Big Brother. He also kind of served somewhat of a fatherly role for me as well. If Charles said I should do, then something in my psyche told me I'd probably be alright.

Before starting forward, I took a good look to size up the situation. I could see that I'd have to hang on to the fence, with the front side of my body close up against it, while keeping my toes up against the base of the fence if I wanted to keep from getting wet. It was so cold and nasty out that day, that getting wet wasn't an option I was even remotely willing to explore. I could see that there was only 3 inches of ground visible between the water that filled the bottomless ditch and the base of the fence. It looked to me as if I could make it without touching the water so long as I was really careful and deliberate with my movements. Try as I might, I couldn't see how deep the ditch was. The water was so murky, I couldn't see the bottom. Even though I couldn't see with my own eyes how deep the ditch was, I just knew that I'd have more than wet feet should I happen to lose my balance while trying to skirt it.

The plan was, I'd go across first. Once Charles saw that I had made it, he told me that he would go and then Sue was to go. So... I started across. I started inching across the expanse, just slowly shuffling along. I couldn't help but look over my shoulder at that ice cold looking water and imagine what it would feel like on a day such as that. Well... I had made it about half-way across, when I came to a point where the water was touching the base of the fence. There was no way to not step in that spot, so I forged on really carefully. Even though I was trying to be really careful with my movements, when I put my weight on that section of ground, a section of turf under my foot sloughed off and the next thing I knew, I was heading into the bottomless ditch! :shock:

When my feet kicked out from under me like that, I lost my grip on the fence and fell right into that ditch. As I was falling, I was hoping that I'd walk away at the most, with wet legs, wet arms and maybe a bruised ego. Oh no! That ditch was so deep, I went ALL THE WAY UNDER!!!! :shock: I went completely under that ice cold water on that windy day, when temps were hovering in the 20's. It felt like thousands of knives were stabbing me all over. The breath just left me. My arms and legs didn't seem to respond as they normally would. It was HORRIBLE!! It makes the hair on my butt stand up just thinking about it!!!!

When I was finally able to break the surface of the water, I remember hearing this high-pitched, girly-sounding scream coming from someone. It took me a few moments to realize that I was the one who was screaming like that. All I wanted at that point, was to just get out of that water. Once I was on dry land, I'd concern myself with damage control. Not now.

When I was finally able to position myself in the ditch, so that I could at least keep my head out of the water, so I didn't have to swim any more, my screams turned to frantic crying. As if what I had been through already wasn't enough, Charles started yelling at me to "STOP SCREAMING VIC! YOU'RE SCARING SUE! SUCK IT UP! STOP BEING A BABY!" Now. Since many of you seem to have at least a somewhat favorable opinion of me, I'm not going to share with you what I was thinking when Charles started yelling at me at that point. I'll just say that my thoughts weren't what most would consider to be pleasant ones and leave it at that.

Anyway... Let's continue on with the story, shall we? Here's where the story gets good (fiendishly rubbing my hands together)!

After Charles had finished chastising me, he told Sue to stay where she was, because he was going to go across and show her how to do it the right way. JERK! Even though I was now standing on dry land, I was still obviously soaked to the bone and freezing. I just couldn't stop crying. When he started across, I could see him try to demonstrate that skirting the bottomless ditch like that wasn't a big deal. He looked to be doing just fine until he got to the spot where the ground had given way under me. When he got to that spot, he paused for a moment, gathered himself and skirted past it. Once he had gotten past that spot he shot me a know it all glance and that's when a big slough of turf HE was standing on let go! Next thing I knew, HE was flying into the bottomless ditch. When he hit the water, HE went all the way under and when HE broke the surface, HE was looking around, because HE heard someone screaming like a little girl. That was when HE realized that HE was the one screaming like that. When I saw him fall in and come back up screaming, I stopped crying immediately. Suddenly, everything was just fine. I started laughing and pointing at him. Of course, he started balling like a baby as he swam over to the edge of the bottomless ditch and waded out the way I had done just moments before.

Being opportunistic as I am, I wasn't about to miss the opportunity he had presented me with. The next thing HE knew, I was yelling at him. "STOP SCREAMING CHARLES! YOU'RE SCARING SUE! SUCK IT UP! STOP BEING A BABY!" I remember looking over at Sue, who was supposed to be next and seeing an absolute look of horror on her face.

As you'll remember, she was supposed to be next. Even though she wasn't supposed to go out into the street under any cirspoogestances, she waited for a lull in the traffic and ran out into the street to come around the ditch that way.

To this day, the only regret I have about that situation, is that what happened wasn't captured on camera. It had to have been priceless to see if you were a bystander. Well... There you have it. Now you know about the bottomless ditch and what happened that day. Like I mentioned earlier; Charles still feels horrible for yelling at me the way he did that day. Whenever he makes mention of feeling bad about how he acted that day, I always remind him that I'm perfectly content with how things turned out. As far as I'm concerned, he paid for his actions the moment he fell in the bottomless ditch himself. There's no need to feel bad about it.

Have a great day!

In case you're wondering...

Reply #1 – March 17, 2010, 12:26:14 AM

My parents had a way of knowing things. Not long before my brother and I encountered the bottomless ditch, we got a basketball for Christmas. Charles asked Mom if we could take it to school with us and she told him we could, but there would be a stipulation. Under no cirspoogestances, were we to dribble the ball. "NOT EVEN ONCE," she said. Well, when Charles and I were about half-way to school, he looked around, didn't see anyone and dribbled the ball a few times. After a couple of dribbles, he carried the ball the rest of the way to school.

Don't you know that later that evening, Mom called us both into Mom and Dad's bedroom with her

(Mom and Dad's bedroom=the Principle's Office) and asked Charles if he had something to tell her. When I heard her ask him that, I knew the firing squad was preparing their weapons. I was ready to ask for a blindfold and a cigarette!

I couldn't believe it! She told him that HE had dribbled the ball that morning on the way to school. Not only that, but she also told him where he dribbled it. That just blew us away! We didn't know if she had the C.I.A. working for her, or what. All we knew was that we had better not underestimate her abilities when it came to knowing what either of us did, even when she wasn't around. I didn't get in trouble, because I wasn't the one who dribbled the ball. Charles was the one who took the full brunt. I think it's safe to say that I was called into the Principle's Office, so that Mom could make an impression on both of us. Mission accomplished!

Having recently experienced this, we figured it would be best to just take our chances with the bottomless ditch. I would have preferred to face that cold water any day rather than Mom, or Dad if we would have gone out into that busy road even for a second and they found out about it somehow. Lol

Man! I miss my parents! They were something else!