A Chapter from The History of Allie

So for a little less than a year of my life, I lived in Washington, D.C. I was 7 or 8 years old, and it was the middle of the summer. We ran around going to fireworks for the fourth of July, did fun sightseeing things, and me and my sister followed my dad and his buddies walking around to bars. I'm sure it was adorable.

One night on a walk home to the garden house where we lived I found a checkbook in the street. This checkbook made me think I was Sherlock Freakin' Holmes. I opened the book, discovered the checks had a name and an address on them!! And mailed it, with a letter, back to that address. I also looked at the date of the last check written and it wasn't very long ago! Less than a month! So surely this person must be missing his checks! It was an address in some nearby state, so I figured maybe he was a work commuter, or came here on a short visit. I prayed that the address was still good (as I know now, my checks still have my address from two whole years ago on them, its obnoxious to update that, so it was good of me to worry) and that no one stole the checkbook out of the mail. I thought to myself "What a good thing that an honest person like me found those checks!"

Apparently the owner of the checkbook felt the same way. He sent me back a care package containing a book on Marines, a sticker, some brochures, and a story about how he works to bust foreign citizens who are smuggling drugs into the USA - "the scum of the earth!" - and a little ego boost about how honest, smart, and clever I was for such a young girl!

I think he wanted to subtly convince me to join the Marines someday. Sadly, he failed. I really wish I knew were that letter was. I think I might know. I'll look for it next time I go visit my boxes of childhood goodies.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

That's my girl! Hope it didn't get wet...

Allie said...

It was one of those heavy magazine paper type booklets, so I'm sure even if they got flooded on, they'll be fine :)

Those poor magazines "published" by my 8th grade english class are toast, though...

Mariel said...

lol i remember this, I remember you receiving a letter but i didn't remember what else was involved. you should find it