Farm Story: Do I Look Like a Pheasant?

One fine autumn day I had been playing with my friend Denece. Denece lived on a farm about 3/4 of a mile from me. When we wanted to hang out together we usually walked through my dad's field to meet, and then proceed either to her house or mine.

This particular day we had played at my house most of the day and it was time for her to go home. We always walked each other 'halfway' home. As we approached the halfway mark, we happened to look into the irrigation ditch that divided our property and the neighbor's and found what were treasures to two eight year old girls. The ditch was empty because the irrigation season was over and winter season was approaching. As we looked into the ditch we could see dozens of little shells in the sandy soil and we scrambled down the ditchbank to load our pockets with the shells. We were ooh-ing and ah-ing over our find when I heard a funny, zinging noise. I looked at Denece and she looked at me with a question mark on her face. We heard the sound again, and along with it the wind swished through the tall weeds on the side of the ditch. It dawned on both of us at the same time that the sound was BULLETS. I remember the terror I felt and we jumped to our feet as the next zing swished by. WHAT THE HECK??

We took off running through the field back to my house, and as we looked in the direction of the bullets we could see our neighbor, outside with his rifle in his hands. He was as horrified as we were when he realized that he was shooting at little girls; not the pheasants he thought were in the ditch.

We didn't play in the empty ditch any more...and I am betting the neighbor didn't go pheasant hunting in his backyard any more either. They say cats have nine lives, and I think I went through several 'lives' during my childhood as well!