Tuesday, January 12, 2010

The Turkey Story


My first wife had an amazing uncle, who was always into some kind of amazing event. He has now passed away, but some of his exploits are legendary in her family. One of my favorite stories that says less about her uncle than it does her grandparents involves her Uncle and the Turkey.

While stationed in Europe during the Second World War, her Uncle thought a nice idea would be to send his parents a turkey for Thanksgiving. This being the 1940’s, and communication being nowhere near what it is today, he sent a live turkey to the house.

Several years later he returned home from the war, and after a much deserved welcome his parents asked him what he’d like to do with the turkey. He was confused, “What turkey?”, he wondered, as he had no instant memory of such an event from several years before. “Your pet turkey, the one you sent home”, they said.

These lovely people had lived for years in a top floor apartment in Brooklyn and had a stairway between their apartment and the roof. The turkey they had received at Thanksgiving, and mistaken for a pet (don’t ask), was living all these years in the stairwell, living on feed her grandparents had provided!

He was dumbfounded! What to do? He sent the turkey to the butcher shop, had it killed and dressed, and they cooked it.

No one was able to eat him however…….

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