By Staff
Michelle Blaylock, Mom's Corner
OK, I have always said there is no such thing as a stupid question. I have told this to my children and classes I have taught. However, I think that I'm going to have to change my opinion. There are a few stupid questions.
Let me explain. This week I watched the news about the miners trapped in the West Virginia coal mine. This terrible disaster was made worse when the families were accidentally misinformed about the number of survivors.
As I was watching this unfold, a TV news reporter asked one of the family members, "So how did you feel after you found out that there was only one survivor instead of 12?" What! How did he feel? How do you think he felt? OK this rates as a stupid question. I think it was incredibly insensitive of the news reporter to ask that question. There were a million other appropriate questions he could have asked. Good grief.
However, this did bring to mind a few other stupid questions I have experienced in my life. I grew up on a farm in southeast Missouri. My daddy was a farmer until I was about 14 or 15 years old.
One year when I was about seven, my daddy and grandfather bought three brand new cotton pickers. Since the new pickers had headlights, Daddy and his hired hands would work long into the night.
One night they worked until close to midnight. They came in, cleaned the pickers, parked them in the huge barn, and headed home for a few hours sleep. About 3 a.m. the phone rang it was my grandparents, who also lived on the farm. The barn was on fire.
By the time the fire truck got there, it was too late. The fire fighters managed to keep the blaze from spreading, but that was all they could do. The brand new cotton pickers were destroyed.
My parents and grandparents were devastated.
The next day a very young reporter came out to the farm. He asked my dad, "Uh, Mr. Tillmon, can you tell me what happened here?"
My daddy looked at him and said, "Yeah, I can tell you what happened. The d– thing burnt to the ground, that's what happened!" By the way, that quote wasn't included in the newspaper article.
I tend to get somewhat sarcastic when I'm asked a stupid question. When we lived in Kentucky I went to buy donuts very early one morning. As the cashier picked up the box of donuts it collapsed and the donuts hit the floor. The cashier looks at me and says, "I guess you want new ones, huh?" My first thought was to say something like, "Naw, I'll just eat them off the floor," but I was a good girl and said, "Yes, please."
Then the cashier says, "Well, it may take a few minutes, are you sure you still want new ones?" My response as I looked at her like she was an idiot, "I really don't care how long it will take I still want new donuts." I wonder if her parents were cousins or something.
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