When I was seven I lived with my friends family for two weeks. I still have no idea why this happened. When ever I think about why it happened, my mind only goes to one thing. Where were my brothers during those two weeks? Were they at a friends house? Were they at home? They would have been 13 and 15 respectively at the time. I suppose that is old enough for them to stay at home by themselves, but young enough that they couldn't be trusted to watch me.
They proved they couldn't watch me when I was four. I wanted some ice cream. They were probably having ice cream. I never would have thought of having ice cream on my own. I couldn't have scooped it either. I was a weak child.
The ice cream was too cold. It needed warmed up. I put it in the microwave. It was an old fashioned microwave. No buttons. Just some dials that you turned. I didn't know how the thing worked. I just turned the dial all the way.
My ice cream cooked in that microwave for 35 minutes. That's how far the dial went. The ice cream was now too hot. It was also just a puddle. I did the only thing I knew how to do as a kid. I cried, a lot. My brothers wouldn't scoop me more ice cream. I already had ice cream that I had to eat. Eventually, I ate the melted ice cream. Maybe that's why I don't like soup.
Maybe my brothers weren't home alone. It could have been that I just had to leave the house for two weeks. Either way, I'm fairly certain that they were at home for those two weeks. If they were to stay somewhere else, it would have been with the same family I stayed with. My whole family and my friend's whole family were best friends.
Whatever the reason was, it happened. Two things happened during the time that I stayed at my friends house. That I remember at least. It was two weeks. I'm sure more than two things happened.
The first is that I went to church with them. This was years before my family went to church with any kind of regularity. I didn't know anything about church. It got worse because my friend was born in 1984. I was born in 1985. This meant that the Sunday School class he was in, was one class higher than the class I should have been in. I would have been the dumb kid in my Sunday School class. I shouldn't have been skipped ahead like this. Surely they wouldn't ask me questions. I shouldn't of been in this class. They'd realize that and not ask me questions about religion.
I was the first one asked to answer a question. I didn't know anything about religion. Not a good excuse. I'm sure none of the kids in that class actually knew anything about religion. I answered the question the only way I knew how to. I cried, a lot. It was embarrassing. This just wasn't a bunch of random kids and my friend that I was crying in front of. I knew all the other kids from school. For some reason this incident never got brought up again. I'd still be mentioning it, had it have been someone else that cried.
The second thing I remember about those two weeks is the time we went to the mall. They had a lot of kids. I was like the seventh or eighth wheel. All of the kids were given a dollar to spend at the mall. I got one of those dollars. This was awesome. My mom never gave me a dollar when I went to the mall with her. I'd usually just say 'I want that' and she'd get it. I never bothered to look at the price. I was probably asking for stuff that costed way less than a dollar. I was going to make it rain with this dollar.
The six of us kids all got a dollar. We were all going to make it rain in that mall. That mall was going to remember us. We all went separate ways. We had different ideas on how to make it rain.
I made it rain in Toys 'R Us. I was into baseball and basketball cards as a kid. What kid wasn't? I'm told some of those cards are worth money now. Maybe there are. I don't have the time to find out. Then find some sucker that will buy them.
I found a pack that was only a dollar. Just my luck. I had a dollar. For some reason, they keep the dollar pack of cards behind glass. I had to ask the grown man behind the counter to grab it for me. In reality, it was probably a 16-year-old kid. But to me, he was a fully grown adult with a great life. His future, and his families future, was secure with his job at Toys 'R Us.
He rang up my dollar pack of cards. Then he asked me for one dollar and six cents. One dollar and six cents? What was this? I only had a dollar. I did what I always did in these situations. I cried, a lot. At least I wasn't crying in front of my friend this time. He was somewhere else in the mall, making it rain.
In fact, I was the only one in the Toys 'R Us. Except for the grown adult, supporting his family of four with his job at Toys 'R Us, behind the counter. The fact that there was only one customer in the Toys 'R Us and he only had a dollar to spend, probably explains why Toys 'R Us left that mall a year later.
The wealthy man behind the counter tried to explain something to me about tax. That's why my dollar pack of cards was one dollar and six cents. How was I supposed to know what tax was? The paper sign had a one on it. That's how much I had. I should be able to have my pack of cards. Him trying to explain to me how tax worked only made my cry harder.
I got my pack of cards. The millionaire behind the counter took care of the six cents. A drop in the bucket for him.
There was only four cards in the pack. I had never seen this before. The packs my mom bought me always had at least ten. I felt like I had been taken. Especially since my friend had gotten some Gobstoppers with his dollar. That box had at least 20 Gobstoppers in it. It wasn't fair. He was more experienced than me. This obviously wasn't the first dollar he had spent. I was a rookie when it came to the spending a dollar game.
I did learn one thing about money that day though. The value of crying is six cents.
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