This story is about the puppet show that never happened.. My two youngest grandchildren call her Grandma Angel.
Once, not long ago, Grandma Angel came down to Earth in a world of make-believe. A strange thing happened. Grandma Angel was about to put on a puppet show, just as she had done back when she lived on Earth
Uncle Jake, with pince-nez glasses and a shock of white hair, sat on her knee.
“Do you have grandchildren?” she asked Uncle Jake, who stroked his beard with his wired arm. He was thinking.
“There are no grandchildren where I come from,” he said.
Grandma Angel was actually speaking for Uncle Jake through tight lips, manipulating his mouth with her hand inside his head.
“I live in a trunk with a few other rag dolls,” he said. “When the trunk lid is closed, the world goes black and I don’t exist. The world is dark and lonely in the trunk. I often wish there was some light in the trunk,” he said.
“Oh?” Grandma Angel said in her own voice.
“I wish you would put a little blue light in the trunk,” Uncle Jake said. “It would be like a star in the night.”
Grandma Angel did not know what more to say, so she ended the episode. She rose from her rocking chair, picked up Uncle Jake and dropped him unceremoniously into the trunk.
Two other rag dolls were in the trunk, Little Miss Prissy and Sparky the Butterfly. It was dark in there, black as night.
Everything was still inside the trunk. Uncle Jake lay flat on top of Sparky, thrown in with nary a thought given to his comfort. He felt miserable.
Wait a minute. Puppets are not supposed to have feelings. Inside the trunk they are nothing, numb, like zombies without feelings. Suddenly something stirred.
“Ow! Watch it you Klutz!” It was Little Miss Prissy. She had spoken!
Never before had anyone spoken inside the trunk.
“You can speak!” Uncle Jake said, surprising himself with his own voice.
“Yes I can,” Little Miss Prissy said, “…and your wired arm is poking me in the side.”
“Sorry,” Uncle Jake said. “I’ll move a bit.”
Then all was quiet again, but it was exciting. Little Miss Prissy had felt something. It was pain, but oh so exciting to feel it.
Morning came, big day.
Grandma Angel was sitting in her dressing room in front of a mirror with 12 light bulbs on top. She was putting on makeup, her face bright in the light. The trunk was on the floor beside the dresser. She reached down and opened the lid, pulling out Uncle Jake, Little Miss Prissy and Sparky. She laid them out on a settee in preparation for the TV show.
“Five Minutes to air!” the studio manager announced, poking his head inside her dressing room.
Grandma Angel went to the powder room.
“Five minutes!” Little Miss Prissy said out loud with a giggle. It felt really good to be speaking on her own.
“Five minutes!” Uncle Jake said, lifting his wired arm a bit. He was alive and it felt good.
“Five minutes!” Sparky said, fluttering his wings.
Grandma Angel returned. She had not heard the puppets speak. She picked them up, opened the door and carried them down a hallway to Studio One. She went inside, sat down in her rocking chair and carefully arranged Uncle Jake on one knee and Little Miss Prissy on the other, having placed Sparky on a shelf behind so the camera would see him.
“Five, four three two…” the studio manager counted, pointing to the On Air sign above the door.
“What shall we talk about today?” Grandma Angel asked Uncle Jake.
“Feelings!” Little Miss Prissy piped up.
“Wait a minute,” Grandma Angel said. “I did not ask you, and I did not speak for you.”
“I have feelings,” Little Miss Prissy said. “I felt Uncle Jake poke me last night.”
This was amazing! They were supposed to be dumb, numb puppets, and they were speaking. Grandma Angel could not believe it. She just sat and stared at the camera.
“Cut!” the studio manager yelled. “What’s going on?”
“My puppets are speaking on their own,” Grandma Angel said. “I can’t believe it!
Uncle Jake pulled himself off her knee and propped himself up, all on his own, against the side of her rocking chair. Not to be outdone, Little Miss Prissy got down and propped herself up against the other side.
“This show is not going according to script,” the studio manager said. “A very strange power has taken over.”
“My puppets have come alive…they have feelings,” Grandma Angel said. So the show got cancelled and Grandma Angel went back to Heaven.
“I’m never going back into that trunk again,” Uncle Jake said.
“Me neither ,” Little Miss Prissy said.
Sparky the Butterfly was gone. He had flown out of the studio, down the hallway and out the front door. He was busy pollinating flowers in the TV station’s garden outside, that being his new mission.
And that’s the story of the puppet show that never happened. It’s another Grandma Angel story I wrote for my grandchildren.