I must have been about 7 years old on this day embedded into my memory. I know I was in the first grade and it was spring. Mom and Dad had separated and were in the process of getting a divorce. We lived in a small little town a couple miles west of another small little town where my Grandmother lived. The school system that I attended was a consolidation of two small schools. My little town had a first grade and there was another first grade in the town that my Grandmother lived in. The rub from my parents pending divorce was that Mom needed for Grandma to watch us kids both before and after school so that she could go to work to support us. Mom must have convinced the School Board to let me continue the few months left in the school year in the classroom that I was used to and officially should attend because of our residence. Special permission was given for me to ride the High School bus to get to my school from my Grandmother’s house. Apparently that was a huge concession on the school board’s part because there was one little girl on a bus with millions (well it seemed like there were that many to my little eyes!) of teenagers.

My uncle David, much to his chagrin, was assigned the task of keeping an eye on me during the bus ride to and from school. How mortified he must have been to have to babysit this chubby little girl who never stopped talking. I could tell that he hated this job he had been given because he would rarely speak to me as we walked each day to the bus stop. He would roll his eyes on some days and grunt a response on others. But mostly he would just tell me to “Be quiet for crying out loud!”

Now, Uncle Dave was a nice kid. He never got into trouble or into fights. He was kind of shy around his peers, as I remember. Not ever a man with a lot to say. One of the kids who would catch up with us most days was a guy named Kenny. He was a scrapper and always in trouble. A real bully and I was terrified of this guy. Sometimes, I thought Uncle Dave was afraid of him, too.

On this particular day, I remember the sun was shining and there were the most beautiful flowers in old Mrs. Smalley’s yard as we passed. I didn’t hear the comment that Kenny made because I was admiring the flowers. Whatever it was, my Uncle David didn’t like it one bit! All of a sudden, I heard books hit the sidewalk and my Uncle Dave was spewing out a tongue lashing like you wouldn’t believe. I turned to see him with his fists in the air as he started in on Kenny. He was ready to beat the crap out of the resident bully and it had something to do with me.

“You don’t ever talk like that about her again you piece of shit! She is a little girl and she can’t help what her parents have done! You even look at her funny and I swear I’ll kick your ass! Now get out of here!” was part of what Uncle David screamed as I stood there in utter disbelief.

Kenny high tailed it out of there muttering something about our family being a bunch of nuts. Uncle Dave took my hands in his and asked me if I was OK. I nodded that I was and I’m sure my eyes were as big as half dollars as I did. Uncle David picked up his books, gently took my hand and led me to the bus stop with his head held high that day.

I think my little head stood a little higher that day, too. I was proud of my Uncle David for standing up to the meanest guy I knew at the time. After that morning, every time I look at Uncle Dave I see a White Knight. I asked him not too long ago if he remembered what Kenny had said that morning that made him so angry. He said he didn’t remember but there were tears in his eyes as I recalled that morning that I found out that I had a Knight in shining armor who would never let me down.

© 2011, Bev Owens. All rights reserved.

When the shoulders of the other kids fell in disappointment over the report assignment, I was grinning from ear to ear and couldn't wait to get started. I've always loved doing research on topics and then writing about what I've found. My newest endeavors are blogging and writing fiction.

Bev Owens

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Tags: bully, childhood memories, family, memoir, pride, white knight

This entry was posted on January 5, 2011 at 10:12 pm and is filed under Memoirs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.