Dead fish

Yesterday I took all the kids to a park. I thought it would be just another ordinary park day. The temperatures were bearable, kids from our old ward were going to be there so that the girls could see some of their friends and the park has water features for the kids to play in. What more could one ask for? I would simply say, "No dead fish." You see about 10 minutes after we got to the park E, T, and M all headed over to the "river" where the water comes from a stocked pond and emerges about 100 yards away in a cement stream bed. Kids love playing in algae infested water. Did I mention that there is perfectly clean water spouting up about 100 feet away from this fake river?

Well E comes running over to me (as H was the only smart one and wanted to play in the clean water) and shows me her dead fish. Yeah, it was dead. Not flopping, not moving, nadda. Well after a while I decide to take H over to where the girls are playing and see what they are doing. When I get over there, M is wet up to her waist and she is holding a dead fish in her hand, holding it exactly like she holds a treasure. I asked M what she had and T quite excitedly exclaims, "She found a dead fish! Wanna see mine?" No I don't want to see yours and I would appreciate it very much if you would throw them away in that garbage can. Yet this is what came out, "Do we really have to find the dead fish and hold them? Let's leave them alone." M tells me, "Dook (look) mom. It dyed." Yes, all the fishes that the children were finding were dead. One of the mothers I was with asked if we should worry if all the fish were dead and that if one of the children got sick we could probably count on all of them getting sick seeming as all the children were hunting for these two inch dead fish.

Now to make it even more memorable here is what I see:
Girl running and screaming hysterically followed closely by E and her friend H. In E's hand is a dead fish. Girl keeps running and screaming and E is laughing saying, "It's just a dead fish!"
I know that this girl has taunted E and H for the past year and is always saying that she's the princess and they are the slaves and blah blah blah. It is funny in that E and H are finally getting the upper hand but at the same time I know that I should step in especially when I see E getting ready to throw the fish at the Girl. I told E that it wasn't nice to throw dead fishes at others and that they really need to stop chasing the Girl and that perhaps they should really go wash their hands. E agrees to throw the fish away and to go wash her hands of the fish smell, but not before looking one more time at the fish and the Girl.

So all in all it was another great but not so ordinary day at the park.