First of all, I don't mean
"petrified" as in scared to death, but rather "petrified"
as in turned to stone. This is an interesting story that our family has
experienced & wondered about over the past nine or ten months. I'm sure you
must be thinking I'm just a half bubble off of plumb, & that may be true,
but let me back up a little & explain.
For as long as I can
remember Charley has loved cheese sticks. You know, what I mean if you've been
around kids, those round cylinders of mozzarella string cheese. They are about
4 to 5 inches long & 1/2 to 3/4 inch across. Back when she was two or
three, I recall someone asking Charley what her favorite food was - she
immediately & enthusiastically replied, "Cheese sticks!"
Last summer on one of Darrin
& Charley's trips up here to visit us, Charley was hungry. Being the
prepared dad, Darrin handed her a cheese stick. Soon after Charley was
distracted with something either along the road or inside the car. After
several minutes, she said, "Where is my cheese stick?" She looked all
over for it with no luck. Not on the floor. Not on the seat. Not on her lap or
with the ghouls she brought in the car.
Darrin asked if she had
eaten it already. Charley insisted she hadn't eaten it but she did indeed have
it at one point. Darrin agreed that he had given it to her. We know that
Charley would not have forgotten that she ate it &, of course, she was
still hungry. Darrin gave her another cheese stick which she did eat right away
this time.
Upon their arrival in Sacramento, I
was informed that there is a missing cheese stick that "just
disappeared" in the car according to Charley as she raised her hands in
the air for emphasis. Darrin looked everywhere in the car to no avail. He
reached under the seats, felt in the crack between the seat & the back,
even moved the car seat - but no cheese stick was discovered.
Since then the story of the
missing cheese stick was related to other friends & family members. Several
times in conversation over the past months the mystery of the disappearing
cheese stick has been discussed. How it just vanished has continued to stump
us.
Fast forward to this past
Saturday. Darrin drove up to spend the weekend with us. While he was here, he
decided to vacuum his car really well since our garage makes that task a little
easier. He couldn't remember the last time he had worked on cleaning the inside
of his car. I can totally relate to that, like mother, like son. I talked with
him outside for awhile then went back in the house.
A few minutes later, Darrin
comes in & rather excitedly says, "Guess what I found!?",
holding up a yellowish colored stick. "Omigod!!! You found the cheese
stick!", I exclaimed. Apparently, it had fallen under the front seat &
rolled up against the frame work where he couldn't see it or feel it until the
seat was moved all the way back. Yay!!! The mystery was solved!
But here is the really crazy
& somewhat unnerving part. The cheese stick was literally hard as a rock!
It definitely appeared to be petrified, honestly, like wood in the petrified
forest. It wasn't slimy or moldy or gooey or anything weird. It looked almost
like a dog bone. Both of us were a bit flabbergasted that the cheese stick had
hardened into something that was not about to break but still retained the
approximate shape & size of the original. Bizarre!
We Face Timed Charley saying
we had something funny to tell her. Darrin said to her, "Do you remember
last year what was lost in the car? Charley immediately shouted, "The
cheese stick!" Darrin held it up & said, "I found it! It was
under the front seat where I couldn't see it before." Then we banged it on
the table to show her how hard it was. She was really surprised, too, &
excited that the cheese stick was finally found even if it was now
"petrified". Darrin saved it to show her when we see her later this
month.
Last night I was relating
the petrified cheese stick story to my sister. She, too, became slightly excited
& said she remembered hearing about the cheese stick that just disappeared.
I'm pretty sure our family just might be a little wacko but I love us all just
the way we are! Not to mention that we are the proud owners of a fossilized
cheese stick. How many people can say that?
