Cameron the Daredevil

Cameron, my little girl,

Sure is something else.

She likes to make herself “pretty”,

And wear dresses that “twirl”.

But at the same time,

She’ll take on any dare

Without pausing to use her mind.

I suppose part of her troubles

She could blame on me,

Our clumsiness is genetic,

So she inherited it, you see.

But Cameron is quite the daredevil,

Pushing everything as far as she can,

You’d almost think she was Evel Knievel.

Lost in Geneseo,

Wandering aimlessly alone,

Got so twisted around,

She couldn’t find her way

Back to Dan’s home.

Late in the evening,

Barefoot in the rain,

Half the town and the Fire Department

Driving around with flashlights beaming,

Everyone yelling, calling out her name.

Me just sick to my stomach,

Over and over, her name I was screaming.

Found three miles away,

Out on a farm,

Hungry and scared,

But thankfully in no harm.

She answered all the questions,

The where’s, why’s, and when’s,

Said she had been on an “adventure”.

I was very quick to tell her

It had better not ever happen again!

Voicemail from the grade school,

It was the lady in the office.

“Cameron went down the slide headfirst”,

Was the message that she left for me,

“We thought you should know

Because it looks worse than it really is,

She’s pretty banged up,

Cameron scraped her whole face.”

And Linda was right,

That’s exactly what she did,

She got scared and closed her eyes,

She even scraped her little eyelids!

My tough little girl,

It didn’t even bother her,

Not as I thought it should.

Her only concern,

Was convincing the school

To put something else

Around the playground equipment.

“It didn’t hurt too bad,” she said,

“But I sure didn’t like eating that wood!”

Out to the Arensman place

For her latest escapade,

Clint and Derek “blockin’ out”,

I was reading a book, sittin’ in the shade.

Cameron and Jimmie running freely in the wild,

Running, jumping, screaming, shouting,

Where nobody would get too riled.

Left the kids with Sue

To go ride in the new one-ton,

They should have been all right,

What could they possibly do?

They went to see Teresa,

Sue’s sister-in-law,

And Cameron did exactly

What she has been told a thousand times

Never to do.

She ran up to a strange dog.

The dog, excited, jumped up,

And got Cameron with his claws.

I knew the cuts weren’t deep enough

To really need stitches,

But the marks were on her face,

So I didn’t want her to end up with bad scars,

Because girls, when they get a bit older,

Can be snotty little bitches.

Rudely pointing out tiny imperfections,

Making their peers feel useless and rejected.

So Sue gave her written statement,

It was anything but lengthy.

The cop blew up a “glove balloon”,

And Sue threatened to get his DNA.

The doctor butterflied Cameron’s cuts,

And after lots of talk and paperwork,

We were out the door, on our merry way.

Now, as I sit in the barn writing this,

I just can’t help but wonder,

What will that little girl of mine do next?

Will it be something to her precious face again?

Or maybe something minor,

Like a bruise or a scraped shin?

I guess only time will tell

What courageous, hair-brained, idiotic stunt

Will get crossed off

The “Things To Do To Scare The Shit Out Of Mom” checklist.

I might as well get used to it,

This is who Cameron is,

And hopefully always will be.

Even when she’s scared,

The adrenaline rush takes over,

She can’t stop herself from trying

Something new or exciting.

Hopefully the “minors” don’t turn into “majors”

And as she grows older,

And still finds these “thrills” in life,

Hopefully the “dares” don’t turn into “wagers”.

-Jennifer-