The New Girl

Hello future readers,

On Saturday, it was a super groovy day outside, so after the cartoons were over, I grabbed my jump rope and headed for the playground. All of my friends were already there. Wendy and her sister April were playing hopscotch.

Danny was playing basketball, Sunny was riding her skateboard and Lisa was roller skating.

 

 

 

 

Robyn and Stephanie were playing a game of tether ball.

 

 

 

Sunny saw me and came over to say hello. Then she went off to ride her skateboard some more. She's really good . She can do all kinds of tricks and gives Danny a run for his money. I'm lucky if I stay on the board without landing flat on my face. I'll stick to jump rope.

 

 

 

I was just about to start jumping when I noticed there was a new girl sitting up on the slide all by herself.  I went over to introduce myself.

 

 

 

 

 

She told me her name was Jennifer and she just moved here from Indiana. I invited her to come and play with us. I wanted to see if I could break my record at "Hot Pepper". That's when you jump rope super fast. I can go 15 seconds without messing up. I wanted to see if I could make it to 20 seconds.

 

 

I did it! I got to 20 seconds without messing up. Jennifer wanted a turn. She said she was the best "Hot Pepper" jumper at her old school. So I handed her my rope.

 

 

Jennifer got up to 30 seconds. I was just about to tell her how groovy that was, when she shoved the rope back at me and said, "That's how it's done." I'll admit she was good, but did she have to be so snotty about it?

Danny came over and asked if we wanted to play tag. We all put our feet in to see who was it, and it was Danny. He chased Jennifer and just missed her.

He came after me and tagged me, so then I was it. I chased Jennifer and touched her hair. I tagged her!

She told me she didn't feel it, so it didn't count. I told her that the way we play, is that if whoever is it touches anything on you; your hair, the hood of your jacket, your sleeve, then you're it. She said that they didn't play it that way at her old school so she wasn't it. I reminded her that she wasn't at her old school. Stephanie said it was no big deal and that she would be it. I didn't think that was fair.

When we were all tired of running, Jennifer bought ice-cream and sodas for everyone at the snack bar.

Wait...first she's mean to me, then she cheats at tag and now she wants to make up for it by bribing everybody? I just couldn't dig that. I told her I didn't want any.

She just said "Oh well, your loss." I didn't want to be around her anymore, so I went home. As I walked, I wondered whose class she would be in at school. I think she's the same age as the rest of us, and that means she'd be in one of the two 4th grade classes. I was really hoping she wouldn't end up in Miss LaSalle's class. I'm a pretty nice person, and can usually get along with anybody, but I had a sinking feeling that I wasn't going to get along so well with Jennifer. I'll see what happens at school next week.

Until next time, future readers,
Your friend,
Julie Newman