Day 21 of our 31 Letters Literacy Project is all about WICKEDLY FUNNY!  You know, the kind of thing that is both wicked and funny at the same time.

Today’s letter is inspired by a little poem we bumped into on Day 21 of 365 Days of Literacy for Kids… a poem about a wicked crocodile:

HOW DOTH THE LITTLE CROCODILE by Lewis Carroll

How doth the little crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale!

How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spreads his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws!

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We all know that some kids have a sense of wicked about them.  Come on… don’t deny it!  (Hoping, of course, you weren’t one of these kids!)

Can you remember an experience with a kid like this?  I can.  It happened at Hampton Beach, New Hampshire.  To this day, I think about that kid whenever I go to a carnival or walk along a summer boardwalk.

Find your wicked kid experience and write about it in a letter to your kids/grandkids/special kids in your life.  Get your kids READING!

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Here is my WICKEDLY FUNNY story in a letter to my grandchildren:

March 21, 2011

Dear _________________,

Hi, my little darlings!  Happy first day of Spring 2011!

Today’s letter is #21 of 31… and it’s about a boy who was a bit wicked for doing what he did to me… but what he did still makes me laugh 47 years later.  It’s a kind of WICKEDLY FUNNY story.

I was 12 years old, turning 13 the coming October.  It was August.  I was with my friends, walking along the “boardwalk” at Hampton Beach, New Hampshire.  I remember this very well because my family was moving to a new place in a few days, and this would be my last day with my friends.

Like my friends, I was kinda-sorta–this-much-a-little interested in boys.

We had ridden our bikes to Hampton Beach, parked them and headed to the arcade.  We played skee ball (still my favorite-of-all-time arcade game!).  We had something to eat (can’t remember what!).  And we giggled over cute boys.

There were always lots of cute boys at Hampton Beach.

We walked along, passing the shops, little restaurants and ice cream places.  It was a beautiful late summer day.  There were lots of people at the beach, right across the street.  But we loved walking along, giggling and being wonderfully silly.  We were like a little school of fish, swimming and flowing together in our own little world… looking at all the cute boys!

We all wanted cotton candy.  There was a cotton candy vendor who always gave the BIGGEST, MOST FLUFFY, SWEETEST cotton candy.  They looked like COLOSSAL SWIRLED-PINK CLOUDS.  We watched the cotton candy man twist and twirl his magical CLOUD of FLUFF around those white paper cones that hold that PINK FLUFF in place.

We all got one and headed, again, in our wonderfully silly search of cute boys.

That’s when it happened.  The first time.  Ever.  Ever.  Ever.  To any of us.

Two cute boys stopped right in front of us.   And they talked.  (Who knew that cute boys talked?)

One smiled, and asked, “Where did you get the cotton candy?”

Oh, my.  They like our cotton candy.

We all pointed behind us to the general vicinity of the magical cotton candy man. I don’t remember any of us actually talking.

The other one asked, “How much does it cost?”

Oh, my.  They know about money, too.  They are cute AND smart.

But before any of us could answer, one of those cute, smart boys had grabbed my colossal swirled-pink cloud of fluff and run off.  Laughing.  With the other cute boy.  Laughing, too.

I stood there on the Hampton Beach boardwalk holding nothing but a sad little white paper cone… with scant remnants of pink fluff.  And the feeling that cute boys aren’t so cute after all.

I looked at my friends.  They looked at me.  Then we all burst into almost uncontrolled laughter.  We laughed as we watched those boys (notice I didn’t say cute)  run off through the crowd of happy, summer people.  My friends each took a handful of their pink magic cloud and piled it onto my sad white cone until my cone held a brand new pink magic cloud.

Then we walked along again, laughing, eating our cotton candy… wrapped in the wickedness of those boys and the funniness of what would become a wonderful summer memory for me. It reminds me of a funny little poem about a wicked crocodile.  The last stanza is this:

How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spreads his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws!

Yep.  Our little school of fish had swum right into the mouth of a crocodile!  But we survived to laugh about it…

Love forever and ever,

Grandma Couto

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Mail Tidbit of the Day: This postage stamp says it all!