Last week I got a check from Reader’s Digest. Even though it was an itty bitty check, I immediately thought it could be a scam. I wondered if someone could get information they did not need if this check went through my bank account.
Customer service at Reader’s Digest kept insisting that I must be a contributor. No, I am not. Finally someone took my “what is this all about” question and said someone would call back.
Yesterday I got the callback. Again I insisted that I had sent nothing to Reader’s Digest. Then I was asked about whether I might have submitted to one of their other publications. I had no idea what their “others” were. By that time, I had popped up in the nice lady’s computer. The mystery was solved. It was from Reminisce magazine for the “Newlywed Boundaries” article. It is in the Reminisce Extra issue for July in a section called recollections over the back fence.
The article was severely edited. I have no problem with that. However, they also changed the name. If I could stop laughing, I would be highly offended. It is hilarious.
Here is their version:
A COUPLE OF MULES
When my husband and I married in 1955, he took a job as a roustabout for an oil company in order to support us until his teaching job began in the fall.
We soon established a routine. He immediately showered when he came home from work, while I cleaned out his lunch box to get it ready for the next day.
One day after finishing his lunch at work, he filled the lunch box with sand as a joke. When I opened it later that afternoon, I was surprised, to say the least, but I didn’t mention the sand all evening. And he didn’t ask.
On his lunch break the next day, he finished his sandwiches and started on the fried pie I’d made for him. It took only one big bite for him to realize it was filled with salt instead of cinnamon sugar.
Again, nothing was said about sand or salt that evening. The both of us were too stubborn to be the first to mention anything. It wasn’t until several years had passed and we were sharing early marriage experiences with a few of our friends that my husband finally told the story of our prank war.