Tickle-Monster Raisin-Man

The back porch door slammed shut against it's frame as the children waited at the breakfast table to see who had come to visit. They had a pretty good idea of who it might be. The milk house vacuum pump had shut off for the second time a few minutes earlier. That usually meant that Uncle Clyde had just finished running the cleaning cycle in the milk house which was almost immediately followed by his visit to the farmhouse. The six panel yellow pine door swung into the kitchen and revealed the large yet slightly stooped-over broad-shouldered frame of their great Uncle Clyde. He wore a loose fitting pair of worn blue jeans and an unbuttoned flannel shirt over a light green tee shirt. He topped off his ensemble with an over-sized floppy hat. The hat was black with a golden design and a smaller than average bill. 

The children erupted in exuberant cheers upon the appearance of their favorite great uncle. Clyde Henning was their grandpa Henning's older brother. He had flown B-17 airplanes in World War II and, despite his advanced age, still had a muscled frame that boasted of decades of hard work.

“Ohhh ho ho,” he laughed as he sauntered into the kitchen and sat down on an oak chair. “I've got mail for everybody!”

He proceeded to hand a piece of junk mail to every one of the five children at the table before handing the important mail to Christa. Christa chuckled at the excitement of her children at the worthless pieces of papers they had just received. Every piece was addressed to the current resident, not to each specific child, but they were too young to notice or too excited to care. As the children finished their breakfast, they jumped down from their respective seats and ran over to Uncle Clyde.

“Raisins! Raisins! Raisins!” they exclaimed in turn. 

Uncle Clyde fished a well worn plastic baggy out of his shirt pocket and gingerly picked out one yellow raisin. He held the small piece of dried fruit in his gigantic palm for one of the children to pick up. Just as the small fingers of the child were about to grasp the raisin, the mischievous old man rolled the small treat to his fingers and allowed it to drop through to his hand underneath. 

“Wup, you missed it, there it is!” he exclaimed as he moved his bottom hand above his top hand.

The child cried out in mock anguish as Uncle Clyde dropped the raisin through his fingers again and again until the child was finally able to get a hold of it and shove the small yellow snack into his mouth. Uncle Clyde went through this routine with every one of the five children, making sure that each child had just as difficult of a time as the child before. 

Christa handed Uncle Clyde a cup of milk. She had offered him coffee once but was informed that coffee was not to the older man's liking. Apparently, he had tried it once when he was in the Air Force and had declared that he had never tried anything before that had smelled so good, yet tasted so horrible. He took a sip of the unpasteurized unfiltered farm-fresh whole milk and let out a sigh of satisfaction. The children threw themselves into his lap one at a time, only to be tickled until they squirmed from their perch. This went on until Uncle Clyde's milk was gone. 

When he stood up to leave, the children protested with excessive conviction by blocking his path. He simply picked them up in turn, held them upside down by their legs, and tickled them until they cried uncle...Uncle Clyde that is. Eventually, Uncle Clyde found himself on the other side of the kid barricade. He opened the back porch door and backed out of the kitchen, pushing the children back into the kitchen while simultaneously closing the door behind him. Once the door clicked shut, he pulled another well-worn baggy from his pocket and pinched a clump of comfrey leaves in his large fingertips and placed the leaves in his mouth. He walked out the back porch door leaving a room full of hyper children and one slightly frustrated mother of those recently hyperized children.

“He always does that,” Christa chuckled wryly. “Gets the kids all worked up and leaves me to deal with them. I might be frustrated if we didn't love his so much.”