Saturday, October 30, 2021

The Ghost of the Woodpile

We had a load of wood delivered to refresh the Woodpile. Now comes the not so fun part of having to stack it. Parents at the Woodpile usually “delegate” that chore to their kids. We parents offer the usual explanations that it’s good for the kids to learn about hard work, pitching in to help out the community, and it’s character building. The kids were not buying into any of that this year. The load of wood has sat unstacked for a couple of weeks. I started telling the kids about the ghost that haunts disheveled piles of wood. It continues to haunt everyone until the wood is nice and neatly stacked. Not surprisingly they didn’t believe me and some even laughed at me.

I came up with a plan to create the Ghost of the Woodpile.

I made a ghost out of an old handkerchief. Unfortunately, I noticed the kids completely ignored it and used the pile of wood as a playground.

I soon discovered why my ghost wasn’t working. The kids saw a Titmouse land cautiously near the ghost.

 
It worked its way over to the ghost and grabbed a seed from my snack pile, and the ghost didn’t move an inch. I switched to plan “B”.


One of the kids approached the ghost with the intent of exposing it has a fake.

He cautiously approached to see if he could get a reaction. Nothing happened.

In aloud voice he called out “I not afraid of any ghost.”

Then he got brave enough to climb up on the ghost.

That’s when I slowly poked my head out from the white cloth as if I had been awoken from a long nap.

The kid slid off the ghost and slowly backed away while I steered intently at him as if I could see straight through his skull.

I started to move the cloth around. In my best imitation of a ghostly voice, I bellowed out “Thou shall stack the wood or forever be haunted!

 
“Yikes, the Ghost of the Woodpile is real!!!”

Terrified he ran off to tell the other kids.

I never saw a ‘munk run so fast in my life.

After a hard day’s work scaring kids, the “Ghost of the Woodpile” enjoyed a snack of sunflower seeds.

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