If there's one thing every different group of my friends has in common, it's that any experience we go through is totally worth it if we have a good story to tell later. It makes it so that even the worst of situations can be funny. There have also been plenty of times where a bad situation will end with "Well, at least we have a good story to tell." There are a plethora of stories from my childhood that I've heard over and over again, but I still love them.
Of course, since I decided to write this post...my mind has gone completely blank. Let's see. These will be in no particular order:
The Carpet and The Paint:
When I was probably around 5 or so, my uncle KB (my mom's brother) came to visit us on the island. While my mom was at work, he decided that he would entertain me with an art project. I don't remember what we were painting, but it was red. My uncle had put some newspaper out on the floor while we were painting and when we were done and he lifted up the paper, some red paint had gotten on the carpet. Understandably, my uncle was kind of distressed over getting paint on my mom's carpet and kind of panicking. Well, me and all my 5 year old wisdom GASPED! "I know what we can do uncle KB! We'll just take this red paint, paint the entire carpet red, and mom will never notice!" Simple enough right?
Vocabulary Lesson:
This story is really about my sister, but it's still a family favorite. While on a trip visiting family with my grandparents (dad's parents), my pop was trying to teach us some big words. One word in particular pop was trying to teach Dayna was courteous. He taught her what it meant and intermittently showed her how to use it. Well, that particular trip, Dayna also learned some vocabulary words from our older cousins as well. Words that my pop would not have approved of for us to use. Flash forward to a family breakfast at a restaurant. The waitress took orders and served the table. My pop said to Dayna: "Dayna, the waitress is being very polite and nice to us. What is the waitress being?" Dayna screwed up her face in concentration, trying to think of what pop meant and said: "Ummmm...Shitty?" I'm sure she got a good tip after that.
Another story related to my sister and her mastery of words at such a young age: While walking into church no less, my sister exclaimed: "Pop, Bon Jovi is a hunk!" to which pop replied, "Well if he's a hunk, what am I?" "Ummm...A pile?" Bah dum dum.
Precocious Child:
My Pop was completing a renovation to his kitchen. From a very young age, I think in this story I was four, I was fascinated with buttons, switches, and levers. While walking around and inspecting the renovation, my pop was carrying me and handed me an old switch to play with. I flicked it on and off happily. Then I said, "Pop, I bet if we take some of those wires and connect them here and here and ran it to that light up there, this switch could control that light!" And Pop started to explain that I was right and how certain wires connected and controlled things, then he stopped in his tracks and just laughed. He realized he was carrying on an electrician's conversation with a four year old.
We're not ducks!
Keturi and I were strange children. There's no way around it. We would go exploring in the woods. So what? All kids do that. Well, Keturi and I would pack up a back pack with food, paint our faces with army paint, and then go head out exploring. I should probably mention that we were in sixth grade by this point...that's not that young. Well, this particular day, we decided to cross one of the many marshes that were on the island. We grabbed two 2x4's and would lay one down, walk across it, lay the other one down, and so on and so forth. We got particularly deep in the marsh when we heard some people talking in the distance. We immediately ducked down and hid. We didn't know who's property we were on and didn't want to get into trouble. We decided to keep moving, just staying below the tall grass and sliding the pieces of wood in front of us. Well, of course we were making a lot of noise and we heard one of the guys cock a shotgun and say..."Listen to the size of those ducks out there!" We were petrified that we were going to get shot, but still too scared to jump up and say we were there for fear of getting in trouble. In hind-sight, I'm sure the guys knew it was just a couple of kids goofing around and said that on purpose to freak us out. Later that day, Keturi and I walked to the local grocery store...war paint and all...and got some ice cream. The thing is, by this point, people were so used to our odd-ballness that they didn't bat an eye.
The Plants
That story made me think of another story involving Keturi and I. In fourth grade, one of our projects was to grow these little plants. Each member of the class had one and we put them on these plastic pallets and put them outside to get some rain. Well of course, being the responsible children that we were, Keturi and I were selected to go outside and bring the classes plants into the classroom. We were always selected to go do things and got to leave the classroom. We went outside and got the plants and were goofing off the whole way. At one point, we had the plastic pallet on our heads, supporting it with our hands. We got into the class room and both had the same idea. "Look Mrs. May, No Hands!" At the same time. The pallet of plants fell, face first on the floor. I whipped around just in time to see Mrs. May mouth "Shit!" and did the only thing I could think of to show my remorse...I burst into tears. Keturi immediately dropped to the ground and started to try and put the plants back into their little pots, maniacally saying over and over again "It's ok, It's ok, It's ok, It's ok" Then she said, "It's ok, they were all dead any way!" Good times. I pretty much still deal with accidents I cause the same way today ;-)
The Cough Syrup:
Skipping quite far ahead to my sophomore year of college. My roommate Bryan was THE BIGGEST BABY when it came to taking medicine. I kidd you not, he would rather be on his deathbed than take some Nyquil. Well, his girlfriend Lindsey and I had finally had enough and decided that he would have to take Nyquil. This is probably one of those you-had-to-be-there stories, but I remember it vividly. We were standing in our bathroom, Bryan had the cough syrup in one hand, pinched his nose with the other, Lindsey was standing right next to him with a towel and a cup of water, and I was on his other side with an open box of cereal. We counted down...Bryan took the shot (like it was human waste) writhing and wailing, grabbed the water from Lindsey and downing it, then shoving his hand into the cereal box and shoving it in his mouth. It was the most dramatic assembly line and Lindsey and I were cracking up the whole time. All for a few tablespoons of Nyquil.
Christmas Movies:
While I was in graduate school, I had to get my wisdom teeth taken out. They were all impacted, so it was actually surgery where I went under and then was put on Vicodin afterwards. Well, first of all, I didn't want to come out of the anesthesia at all...I just wanted to stay asleep. Well then, my friend Kara had to take me home. I made her call everyone to tell them I was out of surgery. I made her call my boyfriend at the time like 3 times to tell him that "I put the paint in the closet!" It was very important that he knew this. Kara had been instructed by the doctor to get me a milkshake to eat and help with the swelling. When she asked me what kind of milkshake I wanted, I whined like a little boy, "Awww...I don't WANT a milkshake. I don't LIKE icecream!" She handled it very well and was very accommodating to my drug stupor. Kara pretty much took care of me the entire time I was on my meds except for about one hour, where she went out to get more food. Just an hour. One hour alone. Some sort of Christmas commercial came on the TV and I thought..."I DON'T OWN NEARLY ENOUGH CHRISTMAS MOVIES!" So I got my credit card, stumbled over to my computers, and ordered $167.00 worth of Christmas DVDs! The funny thing is, I forgot about the whole ordeal until the DVDs started rolling in. People always ask me if I returned them. Heck no I didn't return them, all those Christmas DVDs on my shelf make for a great story! (Some of them are still in the plastic...)
I know that there are a million other stories...most of them you-had-to-be-there stories, but the ones listed above are a few of my favorites...also the few that I can remember right this second.
So that's my story for now:
BYEEEEE!
Miss your face, dear friend :) - toli
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