- Jun 12, 2014
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Founding Member
My father-in-law recently passed away at the age of 95. He wasn’t ready to go and planned to live as long as his mother (102), but unfortunately his body simply gave out. He was quite a character. Loved to talk, but was as deaf as a post, so his part in any conversation was as an orator; your part was as the audience. I gave the eulogy at his funeral and shared this story about him as an “engaging conversationalist”:
Not long after my wife and I were married, we were at the in-laws after church for lunch. We had finished eating and were sitting in the den watching tv and chatting, my father-in-law, “Mr. Billy,” reading the Sunday paper, when there suddenly came a knock at the front door. It had to be somebody we didn’t know because family and friends knew to come to the door in the carport. Being hard of hearing, my MIL had to tell my FIL to go see who that was at the door. With a disgruntled sigh and a rattling of the newspaper, he begrudgingly arose and went to the door. I could hear him greeting someone and then closing the door to go outside. Not giving it anymore thought, we resumed our visiting and tv watching.
About 45 minutes later, it dawned on my MIL that Mr. Billy had not come back in the house. In a concerned tone, she told me to go outside and make sure nothing had happened to him. As we were out in the country and had very few uninvited visitors that weren’t family, I wasn’t sure what to expect. To my surprise, what I found was actually a historic event unfolding. The folks who had knocked at the front door were Jehovah’s Witness looking to share their message, but became unwittingly trapped by my father-in-law and for the first time ever, it was the Jehovah’s Witness that were trying to escape from someone and not vice versa! When I say that Mr. Billy was an “engaging conversationalist,” I am not exaggerating! As the late, great Jerry Clower might say, he could “shell down the corn!”
If you’ve got a good in-law story, please share.
Not long after my wife and I were married, we were at the in-laws after church for lunch. We had finished eating and were sitting in the den watching tv and chatting, my father-in-law, “Mr. Billy,” reading the Sunday paper, when there suddenly came a knock at the front door. It had to be somebody we didn’t know because family and friends knew to come to the door in the carport. Being hard of hearing, my MIL had to tell my FIL to go see who that was at the door. With a disgruntled sigh and a rattling of the newspaper, he begrudgingly arose and went to the door. I could hear him greeting someone and then closing the door to go outside. Not giving it anymore thought, we resumed our visiting and tv watching.
About 45 minutes later, it dawned on my MIL that Mr. Billy had not come back in the house. In a concerned tone, she told me to go outside and make sure nothing had happened to him. As we were out in the country and had very few uninvited visitors that weren’t family, I wasn’t sure what to expect. To my surprise, what I found was actually a historic event unfolding. The folks who had knocked at the front door were Jehovah’s Witness looking to share their message, but became unwittingly trapped by my father-in-law and for the first time ever, it was the Jehovah’s Witness that were trying to escape from someone and not vice versa! When I say that Mr. Billy was an “engaging conversationalist,” I am not exaggerating! As the late, great Jerry Clower might say, he could “shell down the corn!”
If you’ve got a good in-law story, please share.