Kathleen's "Crew:A sort of real-life story"

In this story,

is "shell",

is "mushroom",

is "beaver",

is "shapes", and

is "water".

Katie arrived at the boathouse after a long day of school. It was very busy on the Wednesday afternoon. She followed Jennifer down to the boathouse where the

s were waiting. She was lookign at the pretty

on the way down.

Most of the girls that made up the 8 that were a crew for her boat were there. They were taking the oars down to the dock. First, Katie walked to the back of their bay of the boathouse to get the microphone she used to talk across the 65 feet of the

to her rowers in the rew. Then, Katie walked back to get the things to put in the launch their coach rode in to watch them practice rowing. She saw a bunch of funny

jumbled up by the megaphones, but ignored them.

After setting up the launch, the crew warmed up, then went for a warm up run. On the way up, seat 5 in the crew, Monica, stopped and pointed.

"Look, a

," she said.

"That's great, Monica, watch it while your running," said Katie, because the girl rarely ran the whole way.

On the way back the

was still there. It was dragging the funny looking

Katie had seen earlier. All of the girls watched it, with the

in it's teeth, head toward Suicide, the steep hill that the girls ran for excersize sometimes.

When they got back they went to get out the

to go out on the

. The girls lined up on the boat and Katie started giving the commands. When she talked it seemed to be almost in another language, the language of rowing.

"Hands on...roll it out...get around...waists, ready, up... landside, shoulders, and up...walk it out...waterside, shoulders and up...weigh 'nough" she said.

When she was finished, the crew was down on the dock by the

with the

on their shoulders, she started to get the

into the

with some more commands.

"Heads, ready, up...Toes to the edge...roll to waists, and down...out and in, ready out, and it...Starboard side, go get the oars, Ports, open the oarlocks."

The odd numbered rowers ran to get the oars, while the even numbers stayed and opened the oarlocks and held the shell, now in the

. The starboards came back with the oars and all rowers put them in.

"Katie, guess what we saw, a really funny

, right by the oars," said Carrie, laughing.

"Oh, let's get going." said Katie

Soon all was ready for launching.

"Count down from bow when ready." Katie said, telling them to call their number seat in the boat to tell her they were ready.

"Bow, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Stroke" came to her ears.

"Extend the oars...port side, one foot in, and in...starboard side, one foot in, and in...count down from bow when ready,"

and the countdown came again, "shove in two, one, two."

as she spoke the last words, the girls all shoved off and the

was on the

The End

Story by: Kathleen, age 15, USA

Send comments to: Kathleen