Going "Barefoots"

Here's a little something from my "Nice Guys Finish Last..." book. There's no message in this one. I just thought it was a funny story. Enjoy.

The story has been told that when I was three years old, I liked to run around without my shoes. I had no idea what it was called though. I was only 3. My dad and my brother were in Indian Guides and would regularly attend those meetings. This means that I had to stay at home. On one occasion, as my dad and brother left for their Saturday morning Indian guides meeting, my brother wasn’t wearing any shoes. I asked if he was going barefoots, and he said that he was. After they left, I got so excited when I asked my mother if I could go barefoots too, and she said that I could. So, you guessed it, I kicked off my shoes and took off. I was gone all day! No one could find me. My mother called everyone she knew and even some she didn’t know. No one had seen me. I was goin’ “barefoots”. I had no idea what that meant but I knew if that’s where my dad and brother went, then I was going too. I never did find them though.

Later that afternoon, my mother received a phone call from a lady who lived on the next street over, on Airport Drive, the busiest street in the area. This lady told my mother that there was a little boy in her front yard playing and that all he would say was “I’m goin’ barefoots. My daddy and brother went barefoots and I’m going too!” Found, one barefoot little kid! I can only imagine what I put my parents through that day. But hey, mom said I could go!