One day at the end of school, I received a call from my aunt. She told me that something terrible had happened.
I answered, "What? What's wrong!!!" I have an anxiety problem, so my mind instantly jumped to the wrong conclusion.
She replied, "The persimmon fruit that you have been growing for science class the last few weeks..." and she trailed off.
My jaw dropped. "What did you do?" The smidge of optimism that I had felt that perhaps I was overreacting again due to my anxiety quickly left.
She whispered, voice tinted with a dollop of shame, "You know the giant petrified bay leaf that you have hanging on the wall as a souvenir of the time you visited the Redwood Forest?"
"Yes?"
She started to cry. "The rabbi who lives down the street, he came by and asked to see this fruit. He explained to me that it is his favorite in the whole world because he used to eat it all the time as a college student in Tel Aviv. So I brought it down stairs for him to view, but I tripped and faceplanted into the wall, which knocked the petrified bay leaf off the wall, which landed right on the persimmon, which then was bruised."
I stood there in horror, realizing that my science project was now done.
A long pause, and then my aunt exclaimed, "April Fools!"
My aunt has dementia, it was September 24.
Main Ingredients:
aunt
rabbi
persimmon
bay leaf
school
Spice Pack:
1/2 dollop of shame
1 smidge of optimism