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This story was written by Carole Arnett for an English class at Sinclair College –April 17, 1989.

 

 

Mischievous Little Boy

 

On September 3^rd many years ago, a beautiful baby boy was born into our family; we named him Jack. Jack was a sweet, kind  little boy  and we always loved him very much. Jack did have a jovial personality that got him into many interesting situations. He enjoyed playing tricks on people and watching their reaction.  If Dennis the Menace would have had a role model, it would have been my son,  Jack.

    

One of Jack’ s mischievous little events happened when our cousin, Floyd, came to visit. Floyd and my husband were talking and not paying any attention to Jack, Three-years-old. Floyd related an incident and commented, “I got a kick out of that.”  Jack walked up to Floyd, kicked him in the shin and asked_, “Did you get a kick out of that?” Floyd reacted with a shocked look on his face! He laughed while rubbing his leg; to this day Floyd tells the story of Jack to everyone who mentions his name.

 

Jack even played his tricks on his brother and sisters. One of his tricks involved his sister Brenda, who was about 18 months younger than Jack. When Brenda was about four years old, Jack would tease her by telling her she was adopted. He really had her convinced that she was adopted. Several weeks ago (in 1989) Brenda came to me and said, “Mom was I really adopted?” I said, “Of course not Brenda. You and Jack look enough alike to be twins and we already had three children, why would we adopt you?” Brenda said that she could see that now, but at that time she believed her brother.            

 

I must tell you about the time just before Jack entered the first grade. One day, the stove repair man came to the house. Jack went to his dad and said, “Dad, that guy is Mom’s boyfriend; he comes here all the time.” Jack went on to say that the man came dressed different ways, sometimes like the mailman and sometimes like the meter reader. My husband said, “Should I take the ball bat and go hit him?” Jack said, “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah_, go ahead.” He was so excited, just waiting to see what would happen. Fortunately, Jack’s dad understood that Jack was playing another joke. Jack and his dad waited and watched as the repairman went about his business.  Soon the man left the house and this episode was over, but not easily forgotten.

 

Jack didn’t get in trouble very often at school, but he did one day in the fourth grade. The teacher was standing beside a big water puddle. Jack looked at the teacher; then he looked at the puddle. What is a nine-year-old boy to do, but jump into the puddle and splash water on the person standing by? I don’t think Jack could help himself, but the teacher certainly didn’t understand this. Jack told us the teacher would not let him go outside for a few recess periods; he also explained to us the reason for this detention.

 

One of Jack’s favorite jokes was to remove a piece of silverware from the table every time I turned around. It took a long time for me to set the table for dinner each evening, and I never did understand what happened to the missing silver. My guess is that he put the silverware back into the drawer, as I only found a few pieces that had been used for shovels in the sandbox. This hiding the silver game continued all the years that Jack was growing up.

 

The worst trick that Jack played wasn’t meant to be a trick. He had just grown up and left most of his mischievousness behind him when he moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and left a big void in my life.

 

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