The devil is in the details

In the course of my day I travel an average of 120 to 150 miles a day. That amount of traveling puts me in a good number of homes by the end of each week. This past week I was repairing a faulty wall heater. As usual everyone home at the time gather around to watch me work… particularly children. With them in full attendance I must watch my tools carefully… a cordless drill or flashlight is a temptation to great for many to resist.

As I lay on the floor changing out the burner assembly Davis, a precocious 5 year old, has his hands on everything and asking a hundred questions… endless, senseless questions. His mother, also part of my audience, admonishes him repeatedly but to little or no effect. He has my flashlight turning it on and off and shining it in my eyes. When it’s slapped from his hand by his mother he simply grabs my cordless drill and runs around pulling the trigger setting the remaining three children present into a frenzy of laughter and excitement.

When finally caught… with the help of three adults and forced to sit down… he pouts for a few moments and then begins to inch his way back to me and my tools. He eyes his mother quickly and scoots a little closer.

Now as it turns out I have a couple of surgical scars that are clearly visible and I can see him truly inspecting me for the first time.

“What happened to your head?” he asked still inching closer to my flashlight.

Without missing a beat his mother speaks up.

“He was a bad little boy just like you and he grew him some horns. God done reached down and slapped the horns right off his head… making him a good man to fix heaters. Is that what you want? You want God to reach down and slap the horns right off your head so you can fix heaters?”

He fidgets nervously looking to me and then to his mother. Tears began to well in his eyes…

“No mama,” he gulps “I want to play drums.”

I let him keep the flashlight.