Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Write in the HUMOR genre (04/12/07)
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TITLE: Family Banter and the Things Children Say... | Previous Challenge Entry
By Yulanda Ridge
04/19/07 -
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Wide-eyed and very serious he said, “Mommy, you can’t take the plaster off my sore to wash it, because it will kill my sore all dead!”
I stifled back a laugh, looking at my then four-year old who was waiting for me to help him in the bath. He is the youngest of our three, and time was passing all too quickly…
Let me introduce you to our 3 children…
Jason will be 15 at the end of this month. Mandy is 13 and Brandon, our youngest, is now 11. Ah, the ‘tween’ and teen years…
The other day I was talking to Mandy, trying to explain what watching movies at a drive-in used to be like… Parking your car on an incline, clipping a radio onto your car window to listen to the movie while watching the big screen through your car’s windscreen…
Youngest son walked in and I asked him, “Brandon, do you know what a drive-in is?” With an ‘is-this-a-trick-question?’ look on his face he asked, “Like MacDonalds??” Yeah right! Whadeva!
Nights ago I was concocting a stir-fry, and I asked Mandy to go pick some bright red little bell-peppers from our garden. Not being her favorite, she asked me if I could keep hers aside and she’ll have it raw. Okay.
A little while later she was watching me as the assembly line of previously dissected food was added one at a time into the steaming pot...
Suddenly I let in a sharp breath, “Oh deary me! I’ve added your peppers!”
She just pointed at herself and with wrinkly nose said, “No mom, you mean it’s oh deary ME!”
I sometimes wish I could have fair warning of these precious moments so I could start a “life-recorder” and capture everything from start to finish… Time is a thief, and most of the time these incidents occur without notice. Writing some of it down is one way of making sure it’s not all forgotten and buried under the layers of life, like thick fallen leaves…
Last night it was one endless joke after another… I guess you had to be there to hear it in context, but I’ll do my best to replay some of it:
I hope this story is not too ‘crude’, but it was really funny at the time…
At dinner time I asked Jason what he thought of a visit we made to old nursing friends of mine that we last saw just after he was born 15 years ago... We had tea with them this week-end. One of my friends could not believe how our children had grown!
Now imagine the scene when she proudly looks at our tall, blonde Jason, who has a deepening voice and typical teen thoughts of “who am I really, and how do I fit into this world?”, and says: “Wow Jason – look how you’ve grown! Do you know – I was the first nurse to change your nappy (diaper)?”
Well! Jason’s cheeks turned a light shade of scarlet. He smiled sweetly at her, but then looked at me with wide eyes that said “Did she just say that in front of everyone?!”
So last night I replayed this scene and told him how dearly comical his face was. He replied, “Mom, as soon as you’re asleep, I’m going to come and write ‘Pooh-sack’ on your forehead!” That just totally cracked me up as I said, “Jason, excuse me, but weren’t you the one with the pooh-sack she was talking about…?” And that was the end of us…!
Later, reading about Enoch who, at the age of 365 years “was not, for God took him.” I said to the children that I think Revelations speaks of Enoch returning in the last days to warn people..? So Brandon asks if he’ll come back in his same ‘Old Testament’ clothes? Then Jason pipes up with “Someone might say: ‘Dude, you’ve passed your expiry date!’”
Children are a gift from God, loaned to us for such a short time, but souls that will exist for all eternity. As parents we play a huge role as to where they end up in this life and hereafter… They learn so much from us…
But in their everyday banter and play, we would do well to learn from them too and ‘become as little children’ – seeing life through innocent eyes.
Laughter is good, like medicine! I sure got my dose last night!
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This rambled a bit, and separate paragraphs for each speaker would make it a bit easier to read.
Your children seem delightful, and you are certainly blessed to have such a wonderful family!