It was 1964, and we were headed back from the World’s Fair in New York City. I was with my mother, my aunt, my sister, and my two cousins; it was a very big deal for us to travel to NY.
My cousin and I were 11 years old, she born in June and I in July. It was fun having a cousin the same age and we shared many experiences together over our life time.
We had stopped at the Howard Johnson’s (the home of 28 flavors of ice cream) for dinner on the way home. After we had finished eating we were able to order ice cream for dessert.
As the waitress was taking down our selections, my cousin looks up at the waitress and asks her what the flavors were. The rest of us started to laugh at the thought that she was asking the waitress to rattle off 28 flavors.
Well for some reason on that particular day, that incident made us laugh and laugh and laugh. My cousin and I got so silly that we could not stop laughing and finally we were sent to the car to calm down, while everyone else finished eating their ice cream.
We went into the car and instead of calming down, we kept laughing and laughing and laughing. As the years have passed, I don’t remember what we continued to laugh about, except laughing itself, and how good it felt to be so out of control laughing with my life long cousin. Life was good.
When my mother, my aunt, my sister and older cousin came out of the restaurant they stopped dead in their tracks to see the two of us still laughing up a storm in the car. They all burst out laughing and came over to the car amazed that we had not calmed down yet. They got into the car and we all laughed and laughed most of the way home.
Over the years, family gatherings have lessened as the family has grown so big, but we would still spend every Christmas Eve together. For years we would re-tell that story, and when we tell the story, we start to laugh, and laugh and laugh… and get everyone around us laughing.
Now we can look back and say that the incident was not a particularly funny incident to warrant all the chaos that followed. No, there definitely was something more, something on a profound level that connected us in laughter that day.
While I know that since that time, many funny things have happened to me, but when I tried to think of them for this assignment, I could not think of one. The first thing I thought of was that day in Howard Johnson’s more than forty years ago.
This afternoon, I attended a baby shower and all of my family was there. I went over to my cousins and asked them if they remembered that day in NY and what we were laughing about. You bet they did, and we retold the story for my cousin's daughter and we laughed and laughed and laughed.
So there you have it, a funny experience (which may not be that funny to some) but the bond that it provided has proven strong over 40 years later.
My cousin and I were 11 years old, she born in June and I in July. It was fun having a cousin the same age and we shared many experiences together over our life time.
We had stopped at the Howard Johnson’s (the home of 28 flavors of ice cream) for dinner on the way home. After we had finished eating we were able to order ice cream for dessert.
As the waitress was taking down our selections, my cousin looks up at the waitress and asks her what the flavors were. The rest of us started to laugh at the thought that she was asking the waitress to rattle off 28 flavors.
Well for some reason on that particular day, that incident made us laugh and laugh and laugh. My cousin and I got so silly that we could not stop laughing and finally we were sent to the car to calm down, while everyone else finished eating their ice cream.
We went into the car and instead of calming down, we kept laughing and laughing and laughing. As the years have passed, I don’t remember what we continued to laugh about, except laughing itself, and how good it felt to be so out of control laughing with my life long cousin. Life was good.
When my mother, my aunt, my sister and older cousin came out of the restaurant they stopped dead in their tracks to see the two of us still laughing up a storm in the car. They all burst out laughing and came over to the car amazed that we had not calmed down yet. They got into the car and we all laughed and laughed most of the way home.
Over the years, family gatherings have lessened as the family has grown so big, but we would still spend every Christmas Eve together. For years we would re-tell that story, and when we tell the story, we start to laugh, and laugh and laugh… and get everyone around us laughing.
Now we can look back and say that the incident was not a particularly funny incident to warrant all the chaos that followed. No, there definitely was something more, something on a profound level that connected us in laughter that day.
While I know that since that time, many funny things have happened to me, but when I tried to think of them for this assignment, I could not think of one. The first thing I thought of was that day in Howard Johnson’s more than forty years ago.
This afternoon, I attended a baby shower and all of my family was there. I went over to my cousins and asked them if they remembered that day in NY and what we were laughing about. You bet they did, and we retold the story for my cousin's daughter and we laughed and laughed and laughed.
So there you have it, a funny experience (which may not be that funny to some) but the bond that it provided has proven strong over 40 years later.
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