Tuna on Wheatley

My sister tells the Tuna on Wheatley story the best. After all, she was there. If I can get a video of her telling it with the hand motions, I'll post it later.

There have been times in my life that I've been accused of being a little hotheaded. If that's true, I guess I can say I come by it honestly.

Well, here goes - the first in one of our family's many stories - told in no particular order. Imagine this one in my sister's voice.

In the summer, one of our favorite meals was tuna salad with diced apples, with hot peas on the side. Presentation was always important to mom, so this was arranged prettily in a large oval dish. (It didn't matter that sometimes we were so poor we had to have water on our cereal - dinner needed to be presented.)

Our mom and dad were separated, and we lived in the second-floor apartment in Alexandria we'd lived in together as a family of four. Now just three, mom was doing her best to hold things together financially and otherwise.

On one particularly sweltering evening, as we were getting ready to sit down to our tuna and peas masterpiece, there was a knock at the door. Still holding the dish with our dinner, mom opened the door to a man who said, "I tax your furniture." (He was not a native English speaker.)

The funny little man kept repeating the phrase until mom bopped him over the head with the dish. Holding his head and covered with a fragrant glop of tuna, apples and peas, the man looked at mom with astonishment - surprised at the assault but also the elegant woman who'd inflicted it upon him. (Mom was always very prim, posh and proper in a Jackie-O sort of way.) Then he staggered down the steps to the landlord's apartment to call the police.

This was one of the most exciting events of our lives - and in the lives of those in our little apartment complex! We all got to ride in the police car. Mom sat with her chin up and her hands folded primly in her lap, the picture of dignity and refinement as my brother and I waved jubilantly to the curious onlookers who lined the sidewalk.

The officers at the police station were so kind and gentlemanly, pulling out the chair for our mom and speaking gently to her about what must have been an unfortunate misunderstanding. Best of all, my brother and I were given a little bag of chips and a bottle of Coke - an unheard-of treat.

Mom worked as a legal secretary for some well-known D.C. attorneys, so it was only a short while before they posted bail and we got to go home. I later learned that Mr. Wheatley (the repo man) dropped the assault charges.

The next day, "Tuna on Wheatley" made the front page of our local newspaper. Oh, a proud and historic moment that was. I can't believe someone in our family didn't frame that article.

And that's the story of how our beautiful, Southern-belle, white-glove-wearing mom got herself a teeny-tiny little police record.