When I was six there was first grade and the playground at recess. Dirty scratched knees at the hem of my navy blue wool plaid skirt, scuffed saddle shoes, once-white socks, dusty from the loose dirt under the schoolyard swings. When I was six there was after-school walks to my grandma's house on Main Street. Cutting through small-town alleys and wide back yards with clotheslines strung with white sheets, white towels, cotton print aprons, and red long johns.
 
One chilly spring day, meandering home to Grandma's, I ducked under the dangling clothes of one of those small-town clotheslines, fabric snapping and rippling in breezes. I came face-to-face with the seat of Mr. Spaulding's white long underwear. I was alone, and not usually inclined to mischief without an audience. But something came over me that day, all alone between the washed household of the Spauldings'. I spied a soft bed of pine needles under a nearby fir tree. I scooped up a good handful of the prickly brown needles and quietly deposited them into the seat of Mr. Spaulding's drying long johns.
   
As I was about to run off toward Main Street through back yards and grassy alleyways, I  turned momentarily and spied Mrs. Spaulding in her kitchen window, spying me and giving me one mean look.
    Oh, oh. Busted.