My neighbors ran helter-skelter

[Classik]

My neighbor ran Helter-skelter!
I don't want to believe or agree with my spirit that I was a spoilt kid. However, something tells me I was too naughty and mischievous .
I know I really was a torment to both my parents and neighbors - yet it was all kids' mischief.
At 8yrs of age or thereabout (I don't remember exactly) I made an artificial snake. I made this artificial snake from a belt-like rubber material about the length of a big belt. The material was rubber and was black in Color. All I could do was tie one end of a very long and tiny black thread to one end of my artificial snake and then held the free end of the thread. I drew the end of the thread and enjoyed watching the artificial snake move like a real snake.
It was night, I remember exactly, and towards 7pm, and on a Monday when my parents went to bible study and left us all alone behind. You know what happens when kids are left behind!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They own the universe - total turmoil.
No adult was around. So I had all craze to myself.
So the dark of the night made it impossible for people to know it was a fake snake.
One of our neighbors, a fellow kid, saw my work and really enjoyed it. So we were enjoying the whole craze.
Later afterwards, I got fed up with the snake thing and decided to try other things. I inadvertently was still pulling the thread about in our yard. (It was a big compound where we used to live)
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Suddenly, a woman came in, a very lanky and wiry version of a peaceful and friendly female. She saw the snake instantly. I was still unconsciously drawing the thread about and pulling the fake snake along.
She screamed and jumped just as the fake snake was about to touch her leg.
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Let me pause a bit! Hehe! I remember exactly how this woman jumped up. She had made over 3 meters in her jump, and it was as if her original intention was to land on top of the roof or or jump over the fence to the other neighborhood.
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Her voice was thunderous as she screamed and said:
'Snake! Snake!' And under that level of shock she went on to say, 'Classik, it has followed you inside!'
It was all over. I was terrified for I knew I have done something wrong. All I could do was hurry inside the passage leading to our parlour yet with the thread still in my hand. That was when she said, it has followed me inside.
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The other kid was terrified too. He fled inside. We were both trembling.
By this time the entire neighbors and universe flooded our yard. I was surprised to notice the adults. They were all inside.
'Get a matchet!' a neighbor had said.
'Find some wood!' another had said.
'Get cooking gas!' a different voice said.
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They intended using these to kill a snake that does not exist. I managed to come out in the yard and behold neighbors have already got matchet and were breaking buckets and benches in attempt to scare the snake away. I even joined them. At a point I was told to go get some gas.
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Certain gases are naturally pungently that snakes can't resist their smell. So they believed this would make the snake come out from its hiding. I got some kerosene instead and watched my neighbors waste it on a reptile that does not exist.
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All the while I never knew that an adult whom we feared so much had already witnessed when I was pulling the fake snake.
He knew what I did. He knew everything. We called him 'spirit' in those days. Everything about him was ghostly: movement, voice, face, owlish look etc, and with such ghostly appearance and movement he was able to catch naughty boys who played on the bonnet of his car. No one knows when he comes.
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The man simply emerged and drew all attention to himself:

'What snake are you looking for?' he asked.
'A snake - the one that entered...' they tried to answer.
He interrupted them and said:
'Do not mind that kid.'
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I was alive - however I was long dead - for I knew the Spirit was about to figure out what happened.
'There is no snake,' he went on to say, 'I saw that naughty kid pulling that stuff about...'
he explained to the whole world what I did.
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They almost never believed him. One of the neighbors, Joe, angrily asked me to go get my snake. I went inside and got my 'precious tool of disaster'. I handed it over to him.
Instantly, everybody guffawed. It was a collective fellowship of hysteria and resounding guffaws, the kind that rarely comes or happens once in years. Besides it was a mixture of provocation and uncontrollable amusement.
Some were very angry.
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'It is not funny! Do not make it funny :angry,' Joe roared.
I was hoping I'd get blows. My nervousness was obvious.
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'I will tell your dad about this!' Joe barked.

Where would I run to? I asked myself. I have turned the whole neighborhood up side down. Not only that, we have wasted both kerosene and buckets.
As the man was still talking behold my dad was coming in. I could begin to feel lashes all over me the instant I set my face upon my dad.
My dad stopped, both puzzled and anxious. Before he could ask a question I heard a voice, Joe's voice:
'Your kid...'
He narrated all to him, and I was waiting to be butchered by my dad. Instead, I heard my dad laugh: ho ho! He said:
'I remember when I used to do that.'
Having said this, he simply walked inside.
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Incredible! Did my dad just walk away ignoring my catastrophic disaster? Could my dad condone the chaos I caused? Was he pretending? He was not. I was overjoyed. Behold a man I had thought would punish me severely had simple walked away as if nothing happened.
I know the magnitude of my offence - yet my dad was unpredictable. I raised my hand - and giving glory to God :D
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And after this 'tragic ' event I remember I did worse things. :D
I don't pray to have such children today in our midst today

 

[handy]

You were a baaaaadddd boy!

 

[Classik]

Hehe! Maybe.
Perhaps my parents did worse things in their days. Is it hereditary?
Perhaps I was not punished because my dad did a similar thing.

 

[Classik]

Kids do change; it takes time. Some are terrible - but all are childlike. I remember doing certain childish things.
One of the bad things I did was deliberately putting very tiny pebbles inside served dishes. There were times when the dishes were so badly prepared that we ate stones in them. I always crushed stones while the others seldom did. I was kind of asking myself, 'why only me'?
Then I decided to trick my family.
I put tiny pebbles in served dishes. It was deliberately done. I would say:
'You guys are gonna chew pebbles today' And they all did. I did not exclude my father (I don't remember exactly).
And I loved the crushing sounds made when teeth crushed those pebbles.
And they were kind of asking:
'How do you know Everything? You said this guy would crush pebbles and he just did. You said Jennifer would, and she did. You are fantastic.'

I wonder why they had never noticed I seldom chew it.

I know one of these days I would tell them my little tricks. Glee all the way. Naughty me