Jet-Puffed ProvocationWewa Pre-K students declare marshmallow war

Darlene Ake waited 10 years to pelt Bill Carr with a marshmallow.

Last Friday, she got her chance.

 Ake, a Wewahitchka Elementary School Pre-K teacher, began her annual marshmallow fight in 2000 to introduce snow-deprived youths to the joys of a simulated northern winter.

Carr, now assistant superintendent for business services, was then Ake's principal and declined the  invitation.

So for 10 long years, Ake waited, assembling army after after of soldiers trained in the art of marshmallow mayhem.

Each year, on the Friday before the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, Carr avoided the grassy knoll fronting the Pre-K center, where the carnage was visible to motorists cruising Hwy. 71.

But on this tenth anniversary year, fate intervened.

Superintendent Tim Wilder, for many years the chief target of the marshmallow floggings, could not make the fight.

He sent a reluctant Carr in his stead.

Now the assistant superintendent was not exactly a lamb to the slaughter.

Ake, in her usual fashion, equipped all guests with a bag of jumbo marshmallows for self-protection, which Carr gripped fiercely in his hands.

But he was woefully outnumbered by a battalion of marshmallow-wielding Pre K students.

And to make matters worse, he had a bounty on his head.

"See Mr. Bill. He's your target," Ake shouted to the troops. "Whoever hits him, gets a sticker."

With the promise of a scratch-and-sniff dancing in their heads, the students launched a frontal assault on the assistant superintendent.

All decorum fell away - along with respect for one's elders and the societal prohibition against aiming confections at another's face.

Carr was no match for the three- and four-year-olds, who scurried about like frenzied Menads, drunk on their jet-puffed poison.

 The students devoured a marshmallow as part of their pre-fight ritual, and as their insulin rose, so did their courage.

Carr ducked and weaved, but it was no use.  Everywhere he turned, someone launched a marshmallow at his face, his arms, his stomach.

The assault continued well into the morning. Students trolled the marshmallow-strewn field, reloading their bags for another round.

In the end, Carr was saved by the very woman who contrived his torture.

Ake declared a cease-fire and the war was over.

The students transformed back into cherubic cuties so quickly that, except for the trashcan full of smashed marshmallows, the whole morning may have seemed like a dream.

Except to Carr, who could not look at Madilyn Ethridge without seeing visions of the ponytailed warrior princess pelting him with marshmallows.

Summer Sherrod, the fair fashionista dressed in monochromatic purple? 

She was "Terror" Sherrod, her marshmallow hurling prowess matched only by her ability to accessorize.

Carr walked quickly back to his car, out of site of his former tormenters, who dined happily on a post-fight snack.

But no cupcake could bring the assistant superintendent solace.

He'd been bullied, battered and brutalized by marshmallow wielding Pre-Kers.

Where was Wilder when he needed him?