Not enough Alf to go around at lunch time

Few childhood memories endure a lifetime. Most fade, as do the years, conceding to newer, arguably more noteworthy experiences. Yet occasionally, a childhood marvel maintains a permanent place in one’s memory — its immortal status achieved by a rare significance we define as “unforgettable.” For me, that memorable moment occurred during my first grade year at Epsom School, when I met Keisha.

The new kid at school, Keisha lived in the Franklin County community of Rocky Ford with her great-uncle Bill and Aunt Rose. Well into their retirement years, Uncle Bill and Aunt Rose raised Keisha on old-time religion and age-old traditions.

Despite their advanced age and considerable generation gap, Uncle Bill and Aunt Rose showered Keisha with the trendiest toys and most modern accessories – all the envy of my first grade classmates. Oddly, it wasn’t Keisha’s collection of Nintendo games that I coveted most, nor was it her hot pink Trapper Keeper that unfastened with a Velcro rip. Instead, it was Keisha’s lunch box.

“Look what Uncle Bill got me!” Keisha bragged one day during lunch, while my schoolmates and I climbed onto our wooden chairs and slid the squeaking seats to our imaginary placemats.

“Alf!” we all screamed as Keisha unsnapped the top lid of her new, fire-engine red lunch box, brandishing a galactic backdrop and the popular, brown-furred alien from Melmac.

“Let me see it!” I begged, joined by the others who likewise wanted to examine the plastic lunch box advertising the 1980’s family sitcom. Keisha gloated and giggled as the envied lunch box was passed from one set of stubby fingers to the next.

Meanwhile, I sulked as I picked at my peanut butter and jelly sandwich. As lunch time gave way to class time, I silently strategized how to acquire my own Alf lunch box.

“Uncle Bill got Keisha an Alf lunch box!” I told Mama after school, as she prepared my daily afternoon snack.

“Eat your cookies over the kitchen table,” Mama instructed, ignoring my implication as she placed two Oreos onto a paper towel.

“Mama, I want an Alf lunch box,” I said, dunking one of the Oreos into a glass of milk.

“You already have a lunch box,” Mama answered, while I chomped the soggy cookie.

“But I want an Alf lunch box,” I frowned, as chocolate crumbs drifted onto my lap.

“You’re making a mess,” Mama fussed. “Eat your snack over the kitchen table.”

“Mama!” I cried, accidentally knocking my crumb-covered napkin off the kitchen table. “I want an Alf lunch box!”

“You ungrateful children are ruining my house!” Mama exploded as black specks scattered onto her kitchen floor. “You don’t need an Alf lunch box!” she hollered as I leapt from the kitchen table and fled from her fly swatter.

The next day at school, a strangely solemn Keisha raised her hand following the morning’s Pledge of Allegiance.

“Can I call Uncle Bill?” she asked the teacher, who then questioned Keisha’s need to call home.

“I forgot my lunch,” she cried, and then scurried to the office.

I assumed Keisha’s panic was contagious. Because suddenly, the teacher ceased her lecture on counting coins and commenced to clutching her own throat in a most peculiar manner. My schoolmates and I gawked at the teacher, who then released her scarlet-splotched throat and thrust her trembling hand towards an open classroom window.

Had I known the meaning of a “mirage” back then, I would have defined the spectacle as such. For there, slowly sliding from one side of the window sill to the other was a lunch box. A red lunch box. A fire-engine red Alf lunch box.

My classmates and I applauded as the Alf lunch box bobbed about the window sill in a jitterbug fashion.

Just as our teacher neared collapse, the peak of a brown hat ascended the window sill. Keisha cackled as Uncle Bill’s head popped up in a comical Jack-in-the-Box fashion, jolting our classroom, and even the green-faced teacher, into an uproar.

I’m not sure what ever happened to that Alf lunch box. Like the TV series, I’m sure it was replaced by a newer one, as is the norm with our ever-evolving pop-culture fads. Regardless, I often think back to that day at Epsom School, when Uncle Bill paid a visit to our first grade class … and by way of an open window, made sure Keisha got her lunch.