Going home
I believed everything that my Daddy told me in 1956, when I was 5. He once told me that if I would eat onions, which I hated, I could see a fly on a tree outside the kitchen window scratch its back. After I ate the onions and still couldn’t see the fly that was scratching its back, he and my older sister exclaimed,
“Oh, he just flew away!” I was sure my sister and Daddy were telling me the truth.
I guess it didn’t occur to Daddy that I believed everything he told me, and that I couldn’t tell when he was just kidding. One day Daddy and I walked the four or so blocks to his parents’ house. After a short visit with my grandparents, I was ready to go, so I told Daddy I wanted to go home and play. He said, “Okay, go on home.” I took him at his word.
He had no idea that I could even begin to find my way home, but I remembered the way we had come, so I took off. To walk the four blocks home, I had to cross the busy four-lane highway that ran in front of my grandparents’ home.
It wasn’t long before Daddy noticed that I had gone missing. When he couldn’t find me anywhere, he went home where he had to face Mother, who was fit to be tied. I couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about. That was the last time Daddy ever told me to do something that I was too young to do.
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