April Fools Day....

I'm sure all of you have a favorite holiday. For some it may be Christmas, others Easter, and maybe Kwanzaa tops them all. Do you know anybody whose favorite holiday is April Fools day? I do…..my mom!

About a month before April 1st, the wheels in my mom's brain starts spinning and she tries to think of the most original April fools joke she can play on her family. It took until I was 30 years old to begin not falling for her jokes, but there are some good ones she has played on either my family or me that I'd like to share.

Take 1987 for example. I was 11 years old and my mom let me stay home from school for some unknown reason. My dad is self employed and has an office in our basement with a separate phone line. My mom had a hair brained idea and decided to play an April Fools joke on my dad. While my dad was down in the basement working, mom and I went upstairs and my mom called my dad on his phone line screaming. She told him we had been in a car accident and that I was in an ambulance being rushed to the hospital. Our plan was to run downstairs and say "April Fools" before he got in the car. We were too late! By the time we were downstairs he had run up from the basement, got in his car, and was pulling out the driveway before he saw us running out the front door trying to get his attention. We were laughing our guts out….he was not! We quickly learned after that experience that playing cruel jokes like that is not funny; especially when it involves a parent thinking his daughter is going to die.

The next year my mom decided to tone it down a bit considering the year before. She has a friend who is a doctor and she had him draw a vial of her own blood. I remember it was a Saturday and we were out working in the yard. When my mom was by herself she took the vial of blood from her pocket and poured it all over her hand. She started screaming and said she cut herself on something. I ran over to her and started panicking because it truly was real blood on her hand, not just fake ketchup blood. She let me freak out, find my dad, and almost call an ambulance before she began laughing and said, "April Fools". I should have learned from the year before.

Throughout the years she has played all sorts of jokes on us, including calling me at 3 in the morning a few years ago telling me that the prophet of our church had died; telling me my brother is getting divorced; letting me know my cousin would not be going on a mission because he got a girl pregnant; and telling my sister that my grandfather had passed away. Mean, cruel things that are only funny to her.

Let this be a lesson to you all! If you plan on playing a prank for April Fools, think of my mom and the emotional scars she placed upon her family. :)