But Mom…it was an accident
I was talking to a friend tonight and we were talking about childhood memories sparked by an email I read tonight. My friend and I started thinking about the worst thing we did as a child. Not an intentional thing but something accidental. Here is mine.
When I was young we had many “critters”. At the time that my “accident” occurred we had hamsters, Polynesian rats, parakeets and fish tanks 5, 10 and 20 gallon.
My mom was very specific about the birds. “Don’t let them out when I’m not here because if they fly to high in the house you can’t get them” (we were 10, 11 and 13 at the time…me being the 10) we weren’t tall enough to get them back in the cage…but would try….this is the build up people.
My brother and sister were out on sleep overs and I was alone. I opened the bird cage to feed them (which I shouldn’t have done in the first place) and my sister’s parakeet flew out and landed on the curtain rod right behind the 5 and 10 gallon tanks. Man, my mom is a smart woman! I knew she would be pissed if she came home from her date and that bird was out. I took one of the dinning room chairs and moved it towards the curtain rod so I could reach the bird. One of the legs got caught on the shag carpet (yes I’m that old or maybe my mom was just out of date, heh I saved that one). I yanked it a little…boom…right into the 10 gallon tank. I hit it just right. That shit didn’t crack…it put a golf ball sized hole in it. Water…fish….plants rushing on to my mom’s carpet. I just kept screaming “Stop it….Stop it”!” I guess when you’re 10 you think by yelling that you can actually “will” it to stop. You also think when you’re 10 that a Hoover can suck up water. It actually does…it just doesn’t work after that.
I sat at the dinning room table in in front of the evidence waiting for my mom. I knew I was dead, my little tiny little life was over as I knew it. I heard her car….the key in the front door….her heels in the walkway….then she saw me sitting there at 11:30 at night with a broken fish tank and a vacuum cleaner in front of it. She shook her head and said “What happened? I can only assume a bird was out”. I babbled my way through it as only a 10 year old would and it was so amazing that she wasn’t mad. She said “Accidents happen but I’m kind of pissed off about my vacuum.” I had put the fish in a tank that another would have eaten them so we moved them. That was one of the few times in my life that she surprised me. When I think about it now I can’t even imagine what she thought she COULD have come home to. Me, dead because I was trying to vacuum up water with something that was not meant to be used that way. My mom was always the cover up artist…never showed true feelings….I think she was just happy I didn’t electrocute myself. So everything was good.
When I was young we had many “critters”. At the time that my “accident” occurred we had hamsters, Polynesian rats, parakeets and fish tanks 5, 10 and 20 gallon.
My mom was very specific about the birds. “Don’t let them out when I’m not here because if they fly to high in the house you can’t get them” (we were 10, 11 and 13 at the time…me being the 10) we weren’t tall enough to get them back in the cage…but would try….this is the build up people.
My brother and sister were out on sleep overs and I was alone. I opened the bird cage to feed them (which I shouldn’t have done in the first place) and my sister’s parakeet flew out and landed on the curtain rod right behind the 5 and 10 gallon tanks. Man, my mom is a smart woman! I knew she would be pissed if she came home from her date and that bird was out. I took one of the dinning room chairs and moved it towards the curtain rod so I could reach the bird. One of the legs got caught on the shag carpet (yes I’m that old or maybe my mom was just out of date, heh I saved that one). I yanked it a little…boom…right into the 10 gallon tank. I hit it just right. That shit didn’t crack…it put a golf ball sized hole in it. Water…fish….plants rushing on to my mom’s carpet. I just kept screaming “Stop it….Stop it”!” I guess when you’re 10 you think by yelling that you can actually “will” it to stop. You also think when you’re 10 that a Hoover can suck up water. It actually does…it just doesn’t work after that.
I sat at the dinning room table in in front of the evidence waiting for my mom. I knew I was dead, my little tiny little life was over as I knew it. I heard her car….the key in the front door….her heels in the walkway….then she saw me sitting there at 11:30 at night with a broken fish tank and a vacuum cleaner in front of it. She shook her head and said “What happened? I can only assume a bird was out”. I babbled my way through it as only a 10 year old would and it was so amazing that she wasn’t mad. She said “Accidents happen but I’m kind of pissed off about my vacuum.” I had put the fish in a tank that another would have eaten them so we moved them. That was one of the few times in my life that she surprised me. When I think about it now I can’t even imagine what she thought she COULD have come home to. Me, dead because I was trying to vacuum up water with something that was not meant to be used that way. My mom was always the cover up artist…never showed true feelings….I think she was just happy I didn’t electrocute myself. So everything was good.
posted by iamfallingfromgrace at 1:22 AM
1 Comments:
i don't think you should have been left alone all by yourself at age 10. obviously. you could have died. scary!!!!
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