Anna M. Aquino

The weekend Dan graduated from college has become one of those family stories that I won’t likely live down ever. It’s become one of those stories we sit around after dinner and laugh about over and over again. It was a quite the humorous weekend. Dan and I were newly married living in an apartment that really was the back end of a house. It wasn’t the best part of town. We had a mutual secured and gated courtyard but that area was rough. There was a porn theatre around the corner. His parents and my parents were coming in town for his graduation. My parents were running late, and I sent my in-laws and Dan onto where he had to be and waited on the steps of a neighbor’s house for mine. When my parents showed up, my mind was on trying not to miss Dan’s graduation and I accidently left my keys on the steps of the neighbors’ house. I didn’t realize my mistake until we were all going back to our apartment after the graduation. So, we managed to figure it out that we could use Dan’s key...

As many of you know my family and I travel to Canada about twice a year. In the 14 years now that I’ve been visiting my in-laws; Dan and I have collected a variety of funny border stories. There was the time when Dan and I were dating and the American Border Guard asked Dan essentially “what his intentions were” with me as an American. There was the time that we’d forgotten the birth certificate of my oldest daughter when she was about four and made her keep rehearsing “I’m an American from Florida” in the car. Or there was the time where I kept trying to explain to the guard that the “homemade coppicollo” was for our private consumption and it was really okay for us to cross with it. My list of funny stories could go on. We always drive up there borrowing a vehicle from my parents. This summer my parents purchased a brand new luxury vehicle. For years my mother used to put in a note that stated I could borrow her car, and we stopped doing it because in all the years no one ever ask...

This morning my whole family was dragging a bit. The “Monday, Monday’s” can sometimes get to everyone. One kid didn’t want to wake up and stayed in her pj’s until the last possible moment. I’ll admit I felt the same way, and it appeared we all needed something to get us going. I opted to drive the girls to school this morning and had a “Mom you’re so silly” moment. I started car dancing to the morning radio while driving in the car line in front of the school. Before I knew it the girls were laughing hysterically at me, and I suppose a few bystanders were too. But it got us all awake and in a much better mood. It’s too bad the dash board blocked my renditions of the “RunningMan” and the “Tootsie-Roll”! Sometimes you just have to have a silly moment. It’s all too often we go throughout out life being so serious. We can’t be so religiously serious all the time that we forget laughter and smiling is a good thing. Proverbs 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spir...