The Story of Grandma and the Lightning

This is a short story but one that will leave the reader wondering if this is possible or if it really happened. Believe me it did!

Our home can be best described as a box, or my mother was often quoted as saying, it was a “cracker box”. On a summer day, when all the windows and curtains are open to let the fresh breeze in, a person could look in the front window and see the back yard out of the back window. Or a person could look into the kitchen window on the right side of the house and see the yard on the left side of the house. This was proven on one particular summer day.

Although it looks like it might rain, Mom continued to wash the clothes and hang them on the clothes line. Grandma was sitting in her favorite rocking chair that was by the front side window. Grandma would sit and watch the cars go by on the road, bask in the sun light coming though the window, or just nod off into a little nap. My sister and I were playing near the center of the house in the area of the living and dining rooms.

All of a sudden there was not one lightning strike but two. What was really strange was one bolt of lightning came through the front window, where Gram was sitting, and traveled through the house and out the back window. The second bolt of lightning came through the kitchen window and went out the window on the left side of the house. In other words they cross each other. My sister and I drove under the diving room table. When I say drove, I mean drove. We stayed under that table in a start of wonder, confusion, and just plain scared. We didn’t dare say a word. Grandmother continue to sit in the rocking chair, napping.

Mom came into the house and immediately noted that we were under the table. She told us to get out and we told her no. When she asked why, we told her that we didn’t want to get hit by lightning. Of course this surprised her and we continue to tell her how two lightning bolts came through the house. Of course she was skeptable. She told us that it couldn’t have happen, there was no damage to the house and it was just our imagination. We told her that it didn’t hit anything, just when in and out of the windows. She doubted our story, so we get upset and started crying because we were not lying and we couldn’t seem to make mother believe us, until….

Grandmother woke up and was stating that she felt hot and that her feet felt like they were burning. Mom went to her to check her and to see if she was all right. Grandma had been wearing sneakers with rubber souls, and the sneakers were smoking.


The morale is this. If your child is truthful in nature and does not tend to make up tales, then it is your responsibility to believe your child even then the incident he/she is relating is unusual. Sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction.