That Darn Pole Cat

Before moving to Buffalo Junction, Va we had always lived in neighborhoods with dogs, cats, and children on bikes and scooters; but not wild animals. Suddenly there was a whole new world opened to us. We had deer gallivanting through out front yard, turkeys trotting across the road, and bunnies hippity hopping all over the place. Every day seemed to bring a new wonderment of nature. And then there were the skunks...
The dogs would always run off and come home smelling like skunk, but we had yet to see one in real life. One morning we were getting ready for school and Dennis announced from his room that there was a skunk in the front yard. We all dropped our Toaster Strudels and ran to the window. For some reason this was the most exciting news we had heard all week. Th little guy was so cute. He was just sniffing around the yard, minding his own business. Dennis and Sarah Margaret decided that the best thing to do would be to go into the yard and get a closer look. At this point Mom was in the driveway loading up the van, so she could not be the voice of reason. They went outside and before I knew it they were running back inside screaming. Apparently, in their excitement they startled the little skunk and he sprayed them. Surprise, surprise. So I went out to the van to tell Mom what had happened. When I stepped out of the garage and into the driveway I saw Mom and the skunk in the driveway. Mom and I both took off in the other direction. Unfortunately, the van door was left open and little skunky sprayed right into the van. Once we were all back in the house we realized how stupid we had been. Why was it a good idea to approach a skunk? At this point we had to leave for school. So Dennis and Sarah Margaret (who smelled like skunk) climbed in the van (which smelled like skunk) with Mom and I. By the time we got to school we all smelled like skunks.
I had no choice but to just walk to homeroom class. I was already the new girl, and now I was the smelly new girl. I have had better mornings. The skunk was really cute though.

Writing Songs

I received one of my favorite birthday presents ever on my 6th birthday. Dad got me a tape with songs on it. Normally, this would not be that exciting, but this tape was custom made and the songs had my name inserted in them. It was awesome. One of my favorite of these songs was about how I can do anything I want when I grow up. I wish you could hear it, but I will just tell you the lyrics. They are very inspiring, especially is your name is Caroline.

"You can be the President of the United States,
and Caroline can be an engineer and won't make mistakes.
Fly an airplane, lead the army, be a doctor, or play sports.
'Cause Caroline of course you're number one in all you do."

Sarah Margaret and Dennis were not huge fans of this tape, this song in particular. They decided to change the words and would sing this version of the song to me all the time:

"You can't be the President of the United States,
and Caroline can't be an engineer she will make mistakes.
Crash an airplane, kill the army..."

You get the point. This version of the song always made me very upset. I would always tell on them and when Mom would ask them about it they claimed they were singing about Baby Bop, not about me. This was one of the first times the Craft kids wrote a song.

In 3rd grade I received a Girl Tech Password Diary. This diary was voice recognition password protected. I just had to speak a password into the microphone, and it would recognize the word and my voice and open up. I decided that I was going to be a songwriter and the perfect place to keep all my songs was in the Girl Tech diary. This way, no one could read what I had written without my permission. One day Dennis found out my password. I didn't think that was a huge deal though because he still could not open my diary without my voice...or so I thought. I guess Girl Tech did not use very sophisticated voice recognition technology because Dennis spoke my password and my diary opened right up. Dennis read all the songs I had written. I was mortified! There was one in particular that was super embarrassing. In a moment of temporary insanity, I even sang a few for him. Right after I sang it, Dennis started making fun of it. I realized that I had made a huge mistake. I swore Dennis to secrecy.

He still brings up that song sometimes even though it has been like 10 years. He will randomly start humming it to me and laugh. He has never sung it for anyone though, not even Sarah Margaret. I am still worried it will come up in the future. He always threatens to sing it at my rehearsal dinner in front of everyone. That was the only time I really dabbled in song writing. It ended in sheer embarrassment that still haunts me with every note that Dennis hums. I bet you really want to know what the song that I wrote is and why I don't want anyone to hear it. But you will have to keep wondering because I will never tell, even if my Girl Tech diary will.