Thanksgiving calamity

While visiting with a friend the other day, he asked me, "Did you have any calamities over the past Thanksgiving"?

"Sure," I replied, "which one do you want to hear about?"

All the family and relatives who were available gathered out at our home on Jayhawk Road. As the number was pushing 30, we thought it might be a little crowded for the house so we took advantage of the newly built shed to host the gathering.

The weather cooperated and we had everything from the little ones climbing rocks in the yard, many of us shooting clay pigeons, to an improvised tag football game for the younger ones in the back yard.

By the middle of the afternoon most of us were gathered on the deck enjoying the sunshine and conversation. My oldest son, now 44, had taken some ribbing because midway through the festivities someone noticed that he had on two different running shoes. Apparently his new one went on one foot and his other foot was graced with the old shoe. He even managed to pose for a shoe picture while we gave him a hard time.

He and his wife and youngest son were sitting in the porch swing adjacent to the deck. The grandson said to me, "Grandpa, do you think this will hold all of us?" I replied, "Not to worry." We had no more than finished the brief conversation when suddenly there was a crash and the porch swing fell to the deck with the three people seated in it. Along with the swing came about 10 foot of soffit from underneath the eves and the spindly 2 X 2 that had been holding up all of this. When the dust and insulation had cleared, there sat three people with a back drop of siding and debris directly behind them. The more enterprising of the guests snapped a picture of the startled trio sitting on the porch floor.

I think there was some suspicion that I might have installed the porch swing with my usual slip shod carpentry, but I informed them we had a real person come and install this.

We are now waiting on the repair crew to come and fix a couple of pieces of siding, the overhang, part of the soffit and the gutter, all of which were damaged in the calamity.

In the picture of the startled trio sitting on the floor of the porch, the son's mismatched shoes were a clue to how the day had progressed.