Cakewalk

Dictionary.com Word of the Day:
Cakewalk:  something easily accomplished

    School carnivals:  I remember the excitement of those annual events at East Elementary in Grandville, Michigan.  Every classroom held a new experience.  I remember “fishing”: casting your line behind the curtain, where a tug signaled it was time to reel in with your prize.  Then, there was the picking up of cheery yellow plastic ducks propelled along in a stream.  That one felt like a baby game, but the happy anticipation was still there:  maybe this time I would get the duck number matched with the really good prize.  The room with a line, though, was always the ball toss to dunk the principal.

    And, of course, the cakewalk version of musical chairs.  The music—often some scratched record--would begin and I would carefully circle with the crowd around in front of the chairs.  The trick was to keep moving while also being aware of just where the next chair was.  Then, the music would stop, and . . .

    Oops, wrong game.  So let’s start again.  The music would begin and I would carefully walk the circle path of squared-off numbers, stepping carefully from numbered square to numbered square, a little slowly and jerkily as I listened hard for the end of the music.  And then the music stopped and everyone was on a different number for a different prize.  How I wished with all my might that this time I would win that really yummy iced two-layer cake.  That was the prize that would send me down the hallway looking for Mom to take my cake so I could use up the last of my tickets on some favorite game.

    Carnivals ended with a wrought-up excitement over the fun of the evening tinged with a lingering disappointment over some prize not won.  There was the excited chatter and one-upmanship of the short drive home as we compared best prizes.  I clutched my little paper lunch bag of trinkets and candy to carefully go through later.  And, if one of us had been lucky, there was the two-layer cake waiting for tomorrow.