Thinking back before my fatter years, I recalled memories of when I was 5 and my sister was 3. We were the fearsome twosome at that point in life and our parents had to restrain themselves from giving us up for adoption every night. My sister, a girl version of myself, was my sidekick as we came up with new ways to destroy the house each day. However, one boring summer month stands out particularly well and that would be the time I almost lost my pull-up-wearing-side-kick.
My sister and I were digging through what was known as the "Dungeon" to us. It was actually my parents closet, but it was where we were sent when we were in time out. We hated going there because we knew it was cursed. Our cousins had told us that the 3rd sibling, my sister and I had begged for from our no longer childbearing parents, had been buried in my mom's latest pair of Nike's shoebox. We were in the dungeon that day because my mom had decided she was going to take a lifetime to get ready. As we rummaged through things we found what would occupy us for the rest of that month: robe ropes.
They were the belts that went around a bathrobe to keep the bathrobe closed, but we could've cared less. We were young, wild, and generally naked. We had no use for the robe, but the ropes we had plans for. We found out that we had five individual ropes due to the toll our childhood was taking on my father's growing stomach. At the time we lived in a two story house with an open foyer and a staircase in that foyer. So, being the naturally curious kids that we were, we decided we would tie the ropes together and hoist things from the ground floor up to the second floor.
Earlier I said that these only entertained us for about a month. However, it wasn't because we got bored of them, but rather my parents decided that yet another thing had to be thrown away because it endangered my sister and I. Now usually I would say that is a little excessive, but honestly, if we would've kept the ropes we would have killed ourselves and here's why.
When you are a kid, you have to keep one-upping what you are doing, and that's exactly what we did. We started with my teddy bear. It was difficult at first to figure out a good way to tie the rope around it but eventually we figured out that it naturally fit around his neck. This probably should have been the first sign to my parents that we were up to no good, but dad worked most of the time and mom was usually too busy cleaning something. The next thing we used was my sister's life size doll. Once again we did not know where to tie it, so, we went with the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach and hoisted it with a noose around the neck. The thing we didn't account for was the fact that our foyer also had a large bay window that the road, and subsequently, our neighbors could see through into our house. I can only imagine what was said when the neighbors called my mom saying there was person dangling over the second-floor banister. My mom being the carefree caregiver she was, decided it was all in good fun and let us keep doing what we were doing. We decided our next great feat would be to hoist up a small piece of furniture. So we tied the rope to the furniture and started to lift it up. All of sudden my sister says "GOTTA POTTY!" And she took off like a dog seeing bacon after starving for a week. Little 5-year old me couldn't hold this by myself. The two of us barely got it 5 feet off the ground. As soon as she let go, the furniture started to fall. It smacked right into the hardwood flooring and broke into a million pieces. At this point, my mom grounded us from using the ropes for a week.
Finally, once we got the ropes back we decided we follow in the footsteps of JFK and put a person on the second floor...... By way of robe rope. I turned to my sister the day we got ropes back and said, "Hey, let's bring you with the ropes." My sister, being the loyal sidekick that she was, agreed and went downstairs. She put the ropes around her neck like we usually did with the stuffed animals and I began to pull up. I couldn't seem to get her off the ground and she said it was hurting her and couldn't breath (I wonder why.) So I went downstairs and we decided to put it around her foot, instead. I went back upstairs and I began to pull her up. It was working better this time because she was a contortionist as a baby and was able to get on her head with her feet straight up. As I was pulling up she was pushing with her hands off the ground. We get her to where she is just touching with her hands. I told her I need her to push off the ground. With the force of a 1000 explosive diarrhea episodes, my sister pushed her tiny body off the ground. There she was, her head dangling 2 feet above the ground. We were both laughing out of excitement. We had done it.
The front door then opens. It's my mom carrying some of the groceries my dad had just gotten home with. I say, "MOM! LOOK WHAT WE DID!" My sister, hanging upside down in her diaper, waves at my mom. To this day, I have never heard my mom shriek louder and higher than that moment. Both my sister and I were startled by this, and I let go of the rope. My mom, moving faster than the Flash at this point, drops the milk and eggs and makes dive for my sisters head. She catches her head and my sister is safe. The crowd goes wild!!! My mom then got up and sprinted up the stairs faster than lightning. She whooped my butt so hard I couldn't sit down for 3 whole days. Needless to say, the ropes were thrown out and my sister and I never had bath robes until we were in the 4th grade and they were the kind that didn't allow the belt to be removed.
