The turkey, the ring and the pipe

Today is Thanksgiving Day. Or in Spanish "Dia de Accion de Gracia". My entire

family will get together at "abuelita's" house to help cook the turkey. I love abuelita,

she's the best grandmother in the world.

By the way my name is Isabella Concepcion Martinez de la Cruz. But everyone

calls me Conchi or Conchita. I'm 8 years old and I'm in 3 grade. My skin is the color

of hazelnuts and my hair is a mixture of reds and browns. It's kind of wild so my

Mom always keeps it in two long braids. I have big brown eyes like everyone else

in the family and my teeth are a little bugtooth 'cause I still suck my thumb.

Anyway, so here I am in the kitchen sitting on the stoop with my cousins

when my grandmother yells at me: "Conchi, bring me the thread so I can tie the

turkey's legs!" I run and get it from the drawer right behind her. I watched her push

a little bit more stuffing into the humongous turkey and sew the opening shut.

Next, she began tying the bird's legs and popped it in the oven. She turned to

me and said : "Now, run outside and play. And leave Dona Maria alone girls!"

The rest of the evening more family drops by to leave more food or to take some to

another elderly relative that couldn't make it. Dinner as always was delicious,

I ate so much I had to undo the button of my pun-pun shorts.

Just then my 2nd favorite aunt in the whole world called. Her name was Maria,

and she was my Grandma's older sister. She was very tiny just like Mom, but she

had what I like to call a super humongous laugh that can be heard down the block.

She wanted to know whether we saved her some turkey to which my auntie

Zaida replied : "Yes, tia Maria, si, claro. Sure I'll bring you some right now.Okie

dokie. Bye."

It seems my tia Maria didn't want to wait, so Grandma cut her a piece and

send it right away. My cousin Kayla, my sister Christi and I raced to the car faster

than a dog chasing the mailman. By the time my titi Zaida sat in the car we had our

seatbelts strapped on.

As we are parking the car my aunt ran outside signaling with her arms.

Startled we got out of the car. Now check this. It seems my grandma had lost her

wedding ring inside the stuffing and she was recalling all the pieces that went out

for inspection. So we took the turkey inside and started serving it to see who the

winner would be. Just when I thought that we weren't the lucky ones I bit into

something hard. I spat out a chunk of the grounded meat and squished the ring

from inside.

I was the winner! I found the missing ring. I couldn't wait to give it

to Grandma. She will be so happy. We left right away. Everyone was clapping me

in the back as I made my way to "abuela". She looked at it and gave me a huge

hug and a kiss. She went immediately to wash it at the kitchen sink. She told me

in the 45 years since she married grandpa she never took it off and she'd never lost

it.

Just as she was saying this, I heard a metallic clunk and then down the

drain it went. I looked at Grandma's face. It crumpled into tears and had everyone

dashing to the kitchen. The women were weeping while the men tried to take out

the sink pipe. A lot of struggling to help for nothing. The turkey was gone and so

was the ring. Poor "Abuelita"!

(following summer)

Christi was looking at her through the chicken fence in the kitchen. Kayla was

looking out from the window in front of the sink. She was singing an old song while

she washed the dishes and I.. I was going for the ham on the counter. We need

ham for bait so we can kill the rats that kept creeping to steal food from the

animals.

You see we like to call ourselves The Super Girls Exterminators and today we

were on mission. We will cut the ham in cubes and put a pill from grandpa's

medicine cabinet inside the cube and then drip a spoon of sauce on the nugget so

they couldn't smell it. It never fails.

Just when I was ready to snatch the ham Grandma gave a little skriek and

said :"My sink is flooding! Hurry up go outside! Check to see if there's something

stuck in the pipe on the floor."

This house is ancient so a lot of the piping is visible in the backyard. "The

pipe" Grandma mentioned has a gap the length of my hand on top and right now it

was flooding with hair. EEEWWww!!

I grabbed a piece of stick from the floor and began a tug-of-war that had my

sister ,my cousin and I sprawled on the floor with the offending hair ball dangling

from the string. And right there shiny as the sun was: Grandma's Ring!

I snatched it and held it to my heart. It was beautiful with hearts all around and

made with 3 different colors of gold.I threw my head back and yelled:

"GGRaaNDMAAAA! I found your riiing!" She poke her head out the kitchen

door and looked at my hand. She began smiling as she reached out her hand to

me. I slipped it right on her finger. She started laughing and soon we all we're

splitting our ribs. Oh ,Grandma. I told her not to wash it since it's been washing

itself for almost a year.

So to bring a story to an end I'll tell you I love Thanksgiving. Now I'm all

grown up so I stuff my very own turkeys. Somewhere in heaven tia Zaida is bringing

tia Maria a piece of turkey. I always cut a piece for those who didn't make it. But

back home sitting by the chicken screen sits "Abuela Cruz" with a smile on her

face, the sun glinting on the ring on her left hand.

The End

Dedicated to my aunt Zaida Gual Morales and aunt Maria Morales Canales


(I will like to add a special thank you note to those of you who encouraged me
to re-edit my story. I'm forever grateful to Alfred Booth for the time he took
proof- reading and editing my piece. Thank You)