Family . . . . over the course of your life, you may have more than one family. You start off with the family you’re born into – your parents, brothers, sisters, etc. This is your first family or birth family – the one you usually grow up with. Then as your life progresses, you may have other families – a church family, a work family, perhaps a family of your own. I loved my birth family – I had several brothers and sisters, and there were lots of other families where I lived. It seemed safe and peaceful there.
Then one day I was in the yard with my brothers and sisters. It was a sunny day but a bit on the cool side. The leaves were turning gold and orange and red. Just a beautiful time of year – my favorite season actually. Anyway, I was with my brothers and sisters in the yard, and then we all noticed a tall man eyeing us. He strode over to where we were, looked at each of us, and then he grabbed me! He was so much bigger than me and I had no way to fight him off. I stared at my family who were all staring at me too. The man dragged me to his car and put me inside. I did not want to go! I wanted to be with my brothers and sisters. I wanted to get away, but I certainly couldn’t jump out of the car while he was driving 50 MPH. What could I do? The only life I knew was with my family. Now here I was – God only knows where – and getting farther and farther away from those I loved.
Finally, he stopped at a house in the suburbs. He got out of the car, picked me up, and took me inside his house. Inside were two young children and a pretty lady (I hoped she’d help me). She smiled at me, nodded approvingly at the man, but I got the feeling that she wasn’t really going to help me get back to my first family. The children were quite eager to see me. I, however, was not so excited to see them. We were all gathered in the kitchen which seemed to be the center of family activity in this house. There was a lot of talking, asking, describing, explaining and – wait a minute – did I hear that correctly? I thought the young boy asked when they were going to cut me. What?! For a second family situation, this did not seem promising at all!
Then they all left me alone while they ate dinner. When they were finished eating, the man and the two children crowded around me. At first they seemed to be examining me and talking among themselves. They turned me around, turned me back, turned me to one side and then the other. Finally they agreed on which side of me they liked best. Then they drew little triangles and shapes on me. This seemed like odd behavior to me. Then the man brought out a knife – I mean a really big, sturdy, sharp knife! What did they plan to do? I soon found out – the man jabbed me, cutting into my body. He cut off the top of my head and removed it. Then he cut along the shapes he had drawn on my skin. This did not seem like fun to me . . . . but the children seemed quite pleased. Then, to top it all off, he took out my insides!
Then they put me out on the front porch and placed a candle inside me. I guess that was to keep me warm overnight. After all they’d done to me, it seemed like a pretty small favor if you ask me. Anyway, I stayed outside after that. The next night, some children, who resembled small ghosts or witches or some other scary creatures, came to the house, and the pretty lady gave them candy. The children were all excited and said something about how much they liked Jack O’Lantern which seemed to be the name everyone called me. Several more costumed children dropped by that night, and the lady gave them all some treats.
A day or two later, my insides were not looking or feeling so great. The man scraped out the discolored stuff inside me and the kids kept asking about going to the zoo. So off we went to the zoo. I had no idea what lay in store for me there, but I didn’t have to wait too long to find out. At first everyone just walked around and looked at all the animals. Then, when the zookeeper said it was okay, the man carrying me threw me into the pond where there was a large animal named Hippo with a very large mouth. My last memory was of the delighted laughter I heard as I was bitten and swallowed and slid down the throat of Hippo. I never imagined my life would be cut short in such an ignoble fashion. I sure hope my brothers and sisters fared better than I did!
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