高山选注

　　When my first granddaughter Lacy was about three or four years old, she was my favorite shopping buddy!<注1> I could take her for an afternoon of shopping, and unlike a lot of young children, she never asked for anything.

　　On one of these shopping outings<注2> in early spring, Lacy and I had been in several stores and now we were in a WalMart.<注3> As always I had put her in the front of a cart so she could stand and reach all the pretty items.<注4> We went up and down several aisles<注5> looking at everything. When we got into the children's section,<注6> she would reach out,<注7> take a dress off the rack<注8> and say, "Oh Gramma, isn't this one pretty?" After we both admired it she would hang it back up. This is always how we shopped: We looked, commented,<注9> returned the item and moved on. She never asked for those items; she just enjoyed looking at all the pretty things!

　　We then moved on to the shoe department and as I pushed the cart through the little girls section, she picked up and admired several pairs of shoes. Then she saw a pair of hot pink (pink being her favorite color), high-top suede boots.<注10> Slowly reaching for them, she picked them up and cradled them in her arms.<注11> Looking up to me, still holding those boots, she said, "Gramma, please don't make me put them back!"

　　I was surprised with this sudden pleading<注12> and asked, "Miss Lacy, what do you need boots for?" After all it was April, winter was over, and it was almost time to start wearing sandals,<注13> not boots.

　　She replied so sadly, "Gramma, they're huntin' boots!"<注14> Trying to conceal my laughter,<注15> I asked her, "Exactly why do you need huntin' boots?" I knew this dainty, feminine<注16> little girl had never gone hunting with Daddy.

　　She looked at me with an expression that implied God had given her the dumbest of grammas in the world<注17> and she said, "For huntin' Easter eggs!"<注18>

　　I'm not sure how another gramma would have handled this situation. I do know Miss Lacy proudly left that store carrying the sack that held her new hot pink huntin' boots!