Man Digs in His Mother-in-Law’s Backyard and Finds a Videotape — Story of the Day

A man discovers an old videotape while digging in his mother–in–law’s flower garden. The tape took him and his wife on a journey that helped them learn more about the woman.

Tom was fuming. He had been working non-stop on his mother-in-law, Rose’s garden for hours. She had roped him into building a small partition to plant her precious posies when he and his wife Eve visited.

If he had a choice, Tom would have avoided meeting Rose. He did not think she liked him very much even though he had no idea what he could have done to attract ire from her.

Whatever it was, Rose had decided the most suitable punishment would be putting him to work every time she set eyes on him. Hence, Tom had decided to avoid her as much as he could.

Only his wife could veto the decision, and she often did when she needed to see her mom, who lived in the next town, a mere 30 minutes away from their own home.

He was digging up a hole to plant poles into the ground for the partition when his tool hit something that gave a solid thump. Curious, Tom expanded the hole with his hands and was rewarded with an old box that contained a videotape.

Tom kept news of his discovery from Rose and his wife. He could not risk her asking her mom about it, and something told him they needed to at least know what the tape contained before Rose learned about it.

Convinced it was the best thing to do, Tom took the tape home with him when he and his wife left Rose’s house. On the way, he stopped by his friend Jim’s place. Jim was a former TV journalist who had retired to run an electronics store, so Tom knew he would have something to help him view the videotape.

From Jim, Tom borrowed an old VCR he was assured could be used to play the videotape he found. When they arrived...