I was raised by a great storyteller. My father was the master of delightfully squeamish stories and many were told to keep us from hurting ourselves and others were told to keep us quiet.
On the way to my grandfather’s we always passed an old farm house on the edge of Transcona.
My father told my brother and I that “the old Jewish lady lives there, and her favorite thing to eat is rotten little children”. Usually, we refrained from fighting until we were far past the Old Jewish lady’s house. But, one day my brother and I were having an extra harsh fight, and my father stopped the car in front of the old farm house. We looked up through the window and we saw two children being coaxed from another car towards the old house, crying. My father said, ” if you keep fighting in the car…I’m going to have to let you out of the car here”. We immediately forgot about the fight, stunned and sweaty in the back of a wood paneled station wagon, fearing for our lives and starring in absolute fear at the poor boys who were about to be eaten alive at the end of our community.
I know we fought several times in the car after this event, but never on the way to Grandpa’s.
Now, I pass the house roughly once a year and I point it out to everyone in the car. I haven’t told my daughter the story, (I’ve told her plenty of others). I am curious these days about who really lives in that house, how many children are still terrified of what goes on inside it’s crooked exterior. I certainly haven’t the guts to go and ask.
