Out of the mouth of babes...

I've got one more story to tell about my son Chris' sense of humor.

Back in the mid-1980's, there was a rash of child abductions all over the country. Especially from malls and large department stores. Every parent in the country was paranoid whenever they took their children shopping with them.

One day, I needed to go shopping for some work pants and so I decided to take off for the mall. My son was about 5 years old at the time and asked if he could go along with me. I told him that he could but he had to be on his best behaviour and that he had to stick with me like glue the entire time.

"Okay, Daddy - I'll be good." Chris responded as he looked up at me with a big smile on his face.

We soon found ourselves at Sears and as I wandered throughout the men's department searching for just the right pair of pants, I held onto Chris' hand tightly. My son was in fact behaving like an angel and I had been very much impressed. Eventually though, I had to temporarily let loose of my son's hand so that I could pull a couple of pair of pants off of the clothing rack. It hadn't taken me more than 60 seconds to grab that clothing and yet I suddenly realized that my son was gone!

I started quickly scanning the store for all of the exits, my heart raced and my breathing quickened, my mind started reeling with all of the possible scenarios and at the same time I started yelling at the top of my lungs "Christopher, Christopher!".

I was torn between leaving the last place that I had seen him and taking off for one of the exits. The more times I called out his name and I did not get a response, the more close to panic I got.

Suddenly though, I thought I heard a snicker. I listened closer - it WAS a snicker. I turned back toward the rack that held the men's work pants and quickly grabbed the pants and created a big gap between them. There, stood my son Chris laughing and pointing at me.

I was speechless.

"Daddy, you worry too much!"