Holiday Surprise

As my children have gotten older, one of the new traditions we have during the holidays is the drive out to Idaho to take them back to college.  Since we have family in Idaho and Utah, we take this opportunity to meet with them and catch up.  We have been lucky enough, in the last few years, to have someone stay at our house to take care of the dogs, cats and chickens.

One year, one of my older sons volunteered to take care of our home.  We actually put the dogs in a kennel, because he was working in a nearby town and couldn’t get home to let them out often enough. But, he promised he would stop by and feed the chickens and the cats every day.  For some reason, we decided to leave in the evening hours and my son and his girlfriend came by to see us off.

He had been teasing his girlfriend about the ghosts we had in the house, and he thought he would be able to spook her. So, once we were on the road, he turned off the lights in the house. Locked the back door and then stood in the front hallway with her.

“I’ll see if the ghosts will do something for you,” he said to her.

“That’s okay. Really,” she replied.

“No. It will be fun,” he said and then he turned and called back into the darkened house, “Hey, ghosts, why don’t you show yourselves? Why don’t you do something?  Come on, I’m not afraid.”

Suddenly there was a sound like a bowling ball dropping from a closet shelf onto the floor in one of the upstairs bedrooms. The problem is, we don’t have a bowling ball.

Then the kitchen light turned on and off several times.

After that, a shadowy figure floated past the doorway in front of them that led into the living room.

My son, pushing his girlfriend behind him to protect her, rushed her to the front door and out to the safety of the dark night.  He locked the door and made sure he didn’t look back into any of the darkened windows for fear of what he might see.  For the next ten days, when he came to take care of the cats and chickens, he made sure it was in broad daylight.

He arrived at the house soon after we got home and told us about his experience. Being good parents, we sympathized with him and agreed it must have been frightening. Although, we had to acknowledge, they did exactly what he asked them to do.

What’s the old saying? Be careful what you wish for…

Happy Friday!!!

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