Check Your Socks First
Many years ago I traveled as a guest speaker in churches.
For the first couple of years, my wife traveled with me and we
even continued the practice of traveling together after our first
child was born. He went with us in other words. After the
second child, she gave up traveling with me and after the third,
I quit traveling myself. I don't know if there's a hidden
meaning in that or not. Anyhow, we made many friends around the
country as we traveled because we normally stayed in peoples
homes. Often, when coming back through an area, we would stay
one or two nights with friends we'd made before.
One such family lived in a small town in Illinois.
Traveling back that one summer, I called a friend and said we
would be passing through. He asked us to stay with them, if we
would be in the area long enough, and I said we would. This man
and his family had become very special to us because he
personally had lived with us once for about two months as he
hunted for a house to buy in Denver before his family moved out.
Anyhow, Sandy and I stayed with them again this time.
Now, you must keep in mind that I am kind of a joker and I
am always trying to pull funny things on my wife. After you have
traveled a great deal and stayed in many hotels, motels, and
peoples private homes, you easily get board and I always enjoyed
pulling funny things on my wife.
One day, while staying with our friends in Illinois, my
friend came home for lunch. He was a letter carrier for the post
office and his house was on his own route. He had it worked out
so every day he got to his own house to deliver the mail right
around noon. His kids were in school and his wife was off
shopping this day. When Dick came home for lunch, he suggested
frying up a bunch of grill cheese sandwiches and Sandy and I
agreed.
As we sat around the table eating our lunch, I decided to
try and bug my wife just a little. It was summer time and I was
barefoot. As I ate, I moved my foot over till I touched my
wife's shoe and then picked my foot up and put it on top of
her's. I figured she'd yell at me or something so I waited to
hear her complain. Well, my wife has gotten used to these types
of things over the years so she just ignored me. I pulled my
foot off and thought for awhile what I would try next. I decided
to put my foot on top of her's once more and just leave it their
till she got mad enough to say something. Again, I put my foot
on top of her's and left it for the longest time. She was
determined not to give in and said nothing the whole time.
Pulling my foot, back, I chewed my sandwich and thought once
again how I could get my wife to yell. then I had it. Using my
bare toes, I let them walk up my wife's leg till I reached the
top of her sock. Curling my toes around the top of her sock, I
jerked it down around her ankle and quickly pulled my foot back
just in case she tried stomping my bare toes with those big shoes
of her's.
Suddenly, and nearly choking on my sandwich, I realized my
wife wasn't wearing socks. About this time, my friend jumped
back from the table and with his head half way under the table,
he yelled, hay who did that to me? To this day, we laugh
ourselves silly thinking about how big of a jerk I was that day.
The horrible part of the story was thinking about what may have
happened if my friend's wife might have been home eating lunch
with all of us that day and seated next to me instead of my
friend.
Phil Scovell