The coronavirus is certainly having an impact on our nation and the world. Perhaps a little humor will help.
My wife is a long suffering individual and living with an outdoor nut sometimes strains her tolerance amazingly. Other members of my family also have their patience tested, but I have found it all humorous and only been in immediate physical danger occasionally from their lack of understanding. So, tongue firmly in cheek and with as little exaggeration as possible, I will take a look backward to two little misunderstandings.
I’d purchased a new Lynch turkey call and was repeatedly trying to master it. After several hours of practice, so concentrated was I on this task, time flew by, that I seemed to have neglected or overlooked several distraught warnings by my wife threatening various parts of my anatomy and perhaps my life.
Perhaps it was the five hundredth fighting purr in a row that set her off, but a gargled scream came from the living room just as I was leaving my den. Luckily, I am possessed of amazing dexterity on occasion and seeing my wife hurtling toward me, eyes starting, teeth clenched and an expression of madness and hate convulsing upon her tortured face I halted my forward momentum and did an amazing back flip into the den and spinning like a ballet dancer slamming the door shut just as her full weight impacted upon it straining the hinges and the wood creaking as if in pain.
The beating and pounding that shook the room would have done credit to a 350 pound weight lifter and when I soothingly asked if anything was wrong the end of a ballpoint pen was driven through the solid oak of my door.
“Oh!” I yelled, thinking quickly; “I’ve broken my call, it’s ruined!”
The pounding stopped and after a certain period of muttering she moved off. Did I tell you the couch in my room folds into a bed? You know, I had a terrible time getting that pen out of the door, it was really driven in there!
My daughter likes everything in its place, a neat fanatic if I say so. She’s also quite emotional and can even be outspoken on occasion. On one visit as I lay peacefully on my couch watching the Outdoor Channel a piercing scream came from the kitchen. One thousand demons being slowly roasted alive could have sounded no more terrifying.
The savage mailman eating Doberman down the street was near paralyzed by that cry, scattering discarded mail, pieces of uniform and torn mail bags everywhere as it dove into its house to cringe terror struck and quivering in the corner.
The cardinal, singing outside the window, was rendered senseless and tottered off the branch, hanging weakly by one foot, its beak frozen open until it plunked straight down into the grass, no longer red, but a watery pink in color.
I myself was levitated straight up some 6-inches off the couch, hair on end, my toes clenched together so tightly they tickled my arches, 440 voltage seemingly shooting through my body.
Glancing out the window I saw my neighbors collapsed on the front porch, convulsing and twitching, rendered senseless by that piercing cry, their cat upside down, each of its four feet firmly entrenched in the ceiling, every hair on end. All it needed was a bulb in its mouth to be rather unique light fixture.
After I’d ripped my shoes off and straightened my screamingly cramped up toes I gingerly peeked into the kitchen to see my daughter laid out straight as a board on the floor, chalk white, eyes starting, her mouth twitching. Closer examination showed one finger on her right hand pointing weakly at the refrigerator, the only clue of her paralysis and the devastating shriek.
Drawing the largest kitchen knife from the block, I used my still twitching and cramping toes to ease the refrigerator door open and peeked hesitantly inside, then burst into hearty guffaws.
Why, it was nothing but two or three very large night crawlers hanging over the edge of the butter container I kept them in. The big crawlers were swaying back and forth, back and forth like miniature cobras searching for some purchase to continue crawling away. Daughter must have thought there was really butter in that container. Oh, hardy, har, har, har.
I turned my jovial, beaming, laughing face to my daughter, explaining that the container really had big old worms in it, not butter. Isn’t that funny?
It’s amazing how a little humor can bring people around. As I watched the color began coming back to her face, the twitching stopped, her lips curled into a bestial snarl as the lifeless eyes filled with a red tinge, her fingers clenching into fists, an ugly growling sound coming from deep in her throat.
As I watched she suddenly leaped to her feet, crouched and assumed a threatening karate position, quivering with rage. It was then I remembered her extensive martial arts training; broken boards, devastated concrete blocks, etc.
She’d never seen the backflip and ballet pirouette though and the door slammed shut before she struck. I heard my wife enter the kitchen and I was so upset I absent mindedly picked up the turkey call and stroked it.
The last thing I remember is the door bursting open and hazy memories of the ER. My next door will be metal!
