Eleven-Year-Old Best Friends: Singing in the Rain

“Hi, Lilia, this is Mele. Are we still on for tonight? You heard that it’s going to rain, didn’t you?” Mele asked excitedly.



“Yes, we’ll do it tonight!” Lilia exclaimed with pleasure.


“Mom’s bringing me over at five-thirty. Will that be okay?” Mele inquired politely, as she always did.


“That’s great, Mele! Invite your mom and dad to come over after dinner. I’ll put out the invitation here. See you then!” Lilia scurried back to her bedroom to ensure that her white shorts and white t-shirt were available for use.


After dinner, Lilia's parents, Jacob and Francine, and Mele's parents, David and Ioka, and Lilia's grandpa, Apelehama, settled themselves on the covered veranda of the ranch house with their coffee cups. They wondered what the girls had planned for them. Mele and Lilia appeared in white shorts and white t-shirts. They held their bodies upright with perfect posture, as if they were about to dance a ballet. It was a lovely rainy evening, what the girls had been waiting for. Lilia had arranged a medley of songs for them to sing and dance for their parents.


They walked past their parents very gracefully. They pointed their toes and let their weight rest on the balls of their feet, like dancers would do. They glided down the veranda steps and out to the muddy circular driveway into the rain. Lilia cued her dad to press "start" on her boom box. When the music began, Lilia and Mele took off singing and dancing: “Si-i-i-ing-in in the rain, I’m si-i-i-ing-in in the rain…” Their feet plop-plopped in the mud puddles and quick little steps swished-swished. They crooked their knees and feet, hooked their thumbs in their front pockets, and performed a cowboy hoe-down.

Next, they did the Hokey-Pokey for the interlude, which included all the motions in the song itself, “Put your right foot in, put your right foot out, put your right foot in, and shake it all about. Do the hokey pokey, and turn yourself around. That’s what it’s all about!” They shook jazz hands all about in a circle as they splashed each other more furiously. God in His heaven sent down more rain to bless the dirty dancers, and mud flew from here to there and everywhere.


They returned to “Si-i-i-ing-in in the rain, I’m si-i-i-ing-in in the rain. What a glorious feeling I’m ha-a-a-appy again!” The finale included a splash-off between the two girls. Frenzied feet kicked mud at each other and swooshed the crazed mud, up, out, everywhere, into desperate motion.


For the ending, Lilia and Mele sang, “Doo-doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo” as they skipped to the steps to take their bows. The adults viewed two little faces with eyes, but that was about it. Mud drip, dripped down their hair and off the ends of their noses. Mud hung on kneecaps and in between toes. Muddy particles of dirt stuck to every inch of them. Eyelashes blink, blinked in their new camouflage.

“It’s nice when God gives us the props that we need!” Lilia and Mele guffawed together. They took their bows. Francine and Jacob, and Ioka and David sat in nonplussed and stunned silence. Lilia's grandpa burbled with laughter, and then he threw his head back and roared with the hilarity of the dance idea. The two girls threw them a very innocent expression and blink-blinked at them in their muddy attire. Their parents chuckled and then broke forth with uproaorious laughter as the rain sent streams of mud down their faces. Lilia turned to Mele and cried, "That's what I was going for, a sense of utter abandonment!"

Mele slapped Lilia on the back, and hollered, "You goofus!"


Jacob whooped with laughter as he slapped his thighs, and then said, “Okay, you two little piglets, out to the barn, we’ll hose you off before you take your showers.” Jacob never knew what was going to happen next. Lilia and Mele always kept them on their toes. He liked it that way, though. It made life on their little ranch a lot more interesting.