Telling our Stories

There were stories that each of us kids heard about our childhood over and over as we were growing up.  We never tired of hearing those stories and somehow Mom and Dad never grew tired of telling them.  Some of them would bring the entire room to laughter, others were simply comforting.

If you land on my sister's Facebook page too often, you will see her regaling her friends with tales of her encounters with snakes and other vermin in her backyard as she tries to mow or sometimes, just walk to her car.  For her, everything makes a story.  Some of the stories are hilarious (most of hers are - because it's just the way she lives) and sometimes they're a bit more poignant.  But, anything that happens to any of us, can be re-told at a later date to make a point, or just to entertain a friend.

All three of us kids obviously had interesting sleeping habits.  I know that Jim and I both have stories of traipsing around in our sleep, I'm pretty certain Carol does, too ... but, she slept harder than any of us!

Mom and Dad had the only television in their bedroom.  We didn't watch a lot of television when we were growing up and the very last place Mom would allow a TV to be placed was in the living room. That would be much too crass.  During the last year of her life, when she could no longer easily move around the house, she finally relented and moved the television into the living room since that was where her bed was so that she could hang out with the family as much as possible.

Anyway ... since they had the television in their room and watched it well into the evening, long after the three of us kids had gone to bed, when we woke up, we were always drawn to the light.  You know that if kids wake up in the middle of the night, there is probably one major reason - they need to go to the bathroom.  One night, I showed up in their bedroom, bleary-eyed and in need of a bathroom.  Mom realized immediately that she needed to stop me in my tracks and get me turned around.

So, she told me to go to the bathroom and then go back to sleep.  Which, as you can tell by the photo below is exactly what I did.  She got up a bit later and discovered me curled up on the floor in the bathroom.

What are your family stories?  Do you tell them over and over?