When I was in my early teens, one of my older sisters lived next door with her husband and two sons, and I hold a lot of special memories of those days. The following is one of my more funny memories…
I ran through my sister’s back door, yelling as I entered, “You won’t believe what just happened!” I exclaimed, as my sister looked up from her kitchen table.
“What?”, she asked, wide-eyed and concerned.
“Mom got a parakeet at the store today, then we went to get groceries. Well, when we got home, Mom evidently thought the parakeet box was ice cream and put it in the freezer!” (Back then you brought parakeets home in a container similar to what Chinese take-out comes in today).
My sister’s face evidenced her surprise and concern. “Oh, no! Did she get it out? How long did she leave it in there? Is it okay?” She was REALLY concerned about this bird!
“Yeah. She finally found it. But it looked like it was dead! Bill (one of my many brothers) came in and said he heard that if you put just a drop of gasoline on it, it would revive it. So, Mom figured it was worth a try and let him.”
“What?! Gasoline?! What happened?” She was really concerned now!
“Well, the darned thing started flying around the room like it was crazy! It ran into the wall, and ran into the curtains, and just kept going until it finally just dropped out of the air!”
“Oh no!” she exclaimed, throwing her hand over her mouth. Is it dead?!”
“No,” I said now, with a sheepish grin, “it ran out of gas!”
It was a week or two before my sister let me come back, but it was worth it!!!
(And, no. There was no bird.)