The Crazy Life of Savannah Nicole Porter

A Talk with Mom

The screen door squeaked as I shut it. I went to the kitchen to see what time it was. 4:47. Not too late for a snack. I dug around in the cabinets until I found a bag of brownie batter flavored goldfish. They actually taste like brownie batter! I went to my room and tossed my backpack on my chair. It was only a few days until school got out for the Summer. Even though typical basketball is during the Winter, the team I was on decided to join the NYJTTA, or New York Junior Travel Team Association, which was during the summer so that we wouldn't miss school when we went all over the US. Personally I wouldn't have minded to miss school, but that's just my opinion. I finished off the bag of goldfish without even realizing it. Oops. Mom was going to be annoyed. She liked the goldfish more than me. I stuffed the empty bag under my bed and stared out the window. This was something I liked to do sometimes. I imagined what life was like in Louisiana. That was where my parents were from. I figured people there ate deer, after all, didn't they hunt all the time? I was lost in a daydream and didn't hear knocking on my door.
"Savi? Hello?" It was mom
I ran to the door and opened it. "I need help washing the dog. After we are done, why don't you give it a name." I ran into the bathroom down the hall. I washed dogs so often that I knew exactly what they needed to make them happy. "Shampoo, powder, rubber duck..." I muttered to myself. I gathered everything in my arm and went outside to the porch. Mom was there, with the big metal tub. It was already filled with water. I dropped everything beside the tub and went to the backyard to get the dog. It was running around with the other dogs and didn't look as scared anymore. "Here Girl!" I called. The pup came bounding up to me, waging her tail. I looked at her carefully. She was white with big reddish-brown splotches on her, and her eyes were brown. She looked like a dog you would find in the desert. Hmmm... I thought, Desert, horses, ranches... You see, I was trying to come up with a name that sounded western. Suddenly it came to me.

Rancha

I ran to the porch with her. "How about the name Rancha?" I asked Mom. She was nodding. "Yes... It seems to fit her." Mom remarked. We put Rancha in the tub (it took a lot of work!) and began to pour shampoo on her. I don't know what it was- the crisp air, the smell of meat cooking nearby, or the leaves that were blowing into the garage because of some wind that had come from nowhere- but I thought about the country. And I realized I REALLY wanted to know what it was like. So all of a sudden I said to mom,"What's the country like?" She looked at me, surprised that the question had popped up so abruptly. I stared at her. "Well, I lived in a little town about 2 hours north of New Orleans. It had a big middle part of town- this town was about the size of... Harlem maybe. And around the outside were neighborhoods. We hunted and fished and ate fried chicken all day. And saying the word 'ya'll' was something common." She went on to explain more about her life. I listened intently, wishing I could be in the country, and not right outside of NYC, where we were lucky to have a backyard and a porch. That was about as country as NYC was. We dried Rancha off and took her inside, where she curled up on the couch instantly. I sat down beside her and put my head down beside her. I turned on the TV and flipped through the channels and found the NBA playoffs on ESPN. The Boston Celtics were playing the Milwaukee Bucks. I turned the light out and slowly drifted off...