Aloha Fridays: "No, Dad. It's ALL wet!"

Easter Sunday, 1992.
Amouli, American Samoa

My 9 year old brother, Rick (not his real name), woke up bright and early Easter Sunday with a very important message for my parents. 

"Dad," he said as he approached my parent's bed.  Dad cracked an eye to peer at Rick. 

"What?" he groaned.

"My bed is wet," Rick whispered.

"Just put a towel over it and go back to bed," Dad grumped and rolled over to go back to sleep.

"No, Dad.  It's ALL wet," Rick persisted.

Dad groaned and wondered how much water the kid had drunk the night before.  How could his whole bed be wet?  Dad sat up and swung his feet over the edge of the bed.  Splash - splash. 

"What the . . .?" Dad stared in shock at the 4 inches of water covering the floor.  In his half-sleep state, he gawked at Rick as if somehow this child was responsible for the amount of water on the floor.  As soon as Dad's neuron's started firing correctly, he realized this wasn't a matter of an over active bladder, but the result of excessive rain on the mountain behind us that had sent a flash flood through our house.

I was asleep on my large purple pillow of a mat on the floor by the front door when Dad came into the living room hollering at us to get up that we had been flooded.  Drowsily, I threw an arm over the puffy side of my mat and splashed water with my open hand.  It woke me up instantly and by the time I had gotten to my feet, the rest of my siblings were awake and exclaiming in excitement over the water.

It was a beautiful day, but when we stepped outside to survey the rest of the village that lay 4 feet lower than our house, a neighbor wallowed through the flood to ask if we were okay.  We were indeed better off than most of our neighbors, but all our beds were soaked.  

I helped dragged everyone's sleeping pillows out of the house and heaved them onto the clothesline to dry.  Then we spent the rest of the morning cleaning the mud and debris out of the house which included water logged rats, hermit crabs, bugs, garbage and the like.  Needless to say, the Easter Bunny didn't visit us that year. 

Mom tried to come up with something positive about the whole situation, but, I don't remember what it was.  I do remember that the younger kids had a blast playing in the muddy water in our front yard.