Winnie

She was squirrely last night at Bible study. I was in the kitchen for the first part of the evening, before and during the meal, but I heard she was sitting by a friend and they were making little bits of trouble together. When we separated for adult Bible study, youth group, and kid's story and craft time, she was in the group I was helping with. She sat across the table from me, grabbed two markers, and began scribbling wildly on her paper without looking at what she was doing. Then she glanced down to see where the paper ended, moved her markers off the paper, and grinned at me as she kept scribbling on the table. When I reminded her of a rule I'm sure she was aware of (no coloring on the table) and enforced the rule by taking the markers away, she threw down her marker caps, slithered under the table, and began an underground escape. Stephen intercepted her, brought her back, sat with her till it was story time. Molly and I were kept busy trying to seat the other three girls in our group: Marie and Lorinda wanted to sit next to each other so they could chat and conspire, and little M.J. was squirmy and fussy. The girls wouldn't stay seated for more than about 60 seconds before jumping up to try to find a new seat, and they were making no effort to be quiet. Joshua was making great efforts to let his voice be heard above the roar, and we were fighting to make him successful. Then Winnie reappeared from somewhere and climbed into my lap. She sat there for the whole story, not always quiet but responsive to my reminders, not obviously paying attention but who knows what was sinking in? Joshua and the flannelgraph board told us the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt, and we went back to our tables. Winnie stayed on my lap, and I traced her hand, splayed on the table, with my finger as we waited for the other girls to gather and for Molly to pull the coloring sheets back out. I started coloring her scribbled-on picture. She was fascinated, and kept pointing out the next thing I should color, choosing markers for me to use. By the time the burning bush sand craft came out, she was a different girl than the one who had brazenly colored on the table earlier. She stayed in my lap, and worked diligently to squeeze glue, spread it with a paint brush, spoon on sand, and tilt the paper so the excess slid back into the bowl. Marie and Lorinda, though older, were more careless and silly, but Winnie was quiet and made every effort to keep the sand in the right place and complete her picture. When the bus pulled up outside the longhouse windows, she obediently put things away and we tucked her pictures into a paper sack for her to take home. And she slipped out, onto the bus, into the night.