My sister recently complained that she had barely been mentioned in my blog. She suggested that I rectify the situation by telling a favorite story from our childhood. This story involves two tea cozies, a bathroom known as “Planet X” and a set of stairs. In my family it has come to be referred to as “the tea cozy incident.”
Before I tell this story I need to lay a little sibling groundwork. My younger sister and I see each other at least three times a week. We can talk about everything and anything for hours on end, and are just about as close as two sisters can be…now. When we were children we had a difficult time relating to one another. She was a cherub cheeked, perpetually happy, ringleted child who was often likened to Shirley Temple. I was a painfully thin, abnormally pale child who took most of life very seriously and was more likely to be compared to Bee Arthur. My only request is that you keep this in mind as you read the following.
When Jacqueline was around four and I was around seven, we lived in a split level home in a Chicago suburb called Arlington Heights. On the first floor of our house was the living room, dining room, office and kitchen, and up five or six steps was a large bonus room. Up another eight or nine steps from the bonus room were three bedrooms and a bathroom. One day Jacqueline and I were upstairs pretending to be astronauts who were exploring the very distant and very mysterious “Planet X.” Planet X was the bathroom at the end of the hall, which, it may be relevant to point out, was about five steps away from the top of the stairs. We were thoroughly prepared for our mission. We had perfected our slow motion, bouncing moon walk, we had packed a snack in case we got hungry in outer space, and of course, we had space helmets.
I, being the leader of the expedition, had determined that two of our mother’s tea cozies would double nicely as helmets. First of all because they fit completely over the head of a child,which was imperative as we were exploring a planet with no known atmosphere. And second of all because they had holes for the handle and spout that could be seen out of. Or at least one of them did. It was determined (by me) that the older and far more experienced astronaut should wear the space helmet with the holes, and Jacqueline, who could just rely on me to direct her movements, would wear the zero visibility helmet.
At first our mission went exactly as planned. Using my imaginary communicator, I gave detailed directions like, “Over this way,” or “Watch out for the toilet astronaut Jake.” Unfortunately, as I was exploring a large crevasse on the surface of planet X, I neglected to notice that my partner had slowly (and blindly) moon walked her way out of the room. I was in-fact so enthralled with my discovery that I didn’t even notice she was gone until I heard a rather loud thud…followed by seven or eight more thuds. Almost immediately, I jumped out of the bathtub and raced to the surface to survey the damage.
As I watched my adorable baby sister, lying flat on her back at the bottom of the steps, arms and legs gesticulating wildly, and head and neck still completely covered by the thick, flowered tea cozy, it occurred to me that perhaps I should offer her some assistance. But then something strange came over me. Perhaps I was getting too much oxygen from my space pack, or perhaps on some base level I was enjoying seeing little miss ringlets in such a ridiculous pose; but whatever the cause, I started to shake with uncontrollable laughter. I remained frozen at the top of the steps for a long time, laughing so hard that I could hardly breath. The more I laughed the more she flailed. I could hear her cries of protest and indignation, muffled by the tea cozy of course, and that just sent me right over the edge. By the time my mother arrived on the scene I was lying on the floor(still at the top of the steps) with tears streaming down my cheeks, and my hands clasping my sides. Jacqueline, who by this time had abandoned all hope of getting up, was lying motionless on the ground with her limbs splayed out in all direction like Randy from A Christmas Story. I mean seriously, who in their right mind would not find that hilarious?! My mother, that’s who. I don’t really remember what my punishment was for treating my little sister so cruelly, but whatever it was, it was definitely worth one of the most hysterical childhood memories I have. And obviously the ordeal couldn’t have been that traumatizing for Jacqueline. After all, she’s the one who asked me to tell the story.
