Payback For Patrick

 

. . . But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty,

not walking in craftiness,

nor handling the word of God deceitfully;

but by manifestation of the truth

commending ourselves to every man's conscience

in the sight of God.

— 2 Corinthians 4:2

 

 

 

A friend of mine has a darling, hulking teenaged son, Patrick. He's what the nice folks call "social" and "high-spirited."

 

His mom was the last of nine children. She has seen it all, and then some. But there's no end to the ways that a youngster like Patrick can find to push the envelope, and surprise even her. She explains with a loving smile that sometimes, he gets into even worse trouble when trying to get out of trouble in the first place.

 

He's cute, and underneath it all, he's a real sweetheart. But he pushes the envelope. A lot.

 

Kind of reminds you of the human race, eh?

 

'Way back when he was in kindergarten, Patrick, now 17, was given to flitting around the classroom, chatting with his friends, and not paying attention to the teacher. One day, he had been "talking out" more than usual. The teacher warned him several times, but he wouldn't behave. Finally, she took that extreme step of doom:

 

She sent a note home.

 

Now, Patrick could barely read. For all he knew, that note said that he was going to get THE CHAIR for what he did. Not that! He'd miss T-ball season!

 

So somehow, that note wound up back on the teacher's desk next morning, signed like this:

 

 

OK, I made up her name and wrote this version

on our flagstone patio. But you get the drift.

 

 

Forgery! It had obviously been signed with crayon on top of pavement by a child's hand, not with a pen actually held by the mom at the mom's desk.

 

The teacher and mom shared a good laugh about it, and dealt with the fib. It provided a great object lesson about the importance of honesty. The mom has cherished the note ever since, making elaborate plans to spring it on him and his bride-to-be at his wedding rehearsal dinner some day.

 

Now that Patrick has his first real job, an after-school gig doing odd jobs for a guy with a construction company, the mom is enjoying lots of great "payback" for all the challenges that Patrick caused her over the years. He's a great kid, and very smart, with a great future. It's just fun to see him out in the real world, forced to adjust his schtick a little bit.

 

See, Patrick is 6'3", loves the outdoors and hunting and all that male stuff, and likes to think of himself as a grown man now. But at his after-school job, he is low man on the totem pole. He is the other employees' bus boy, gerbil, paper boy, and clean-up guy, all rolled up into one. All the dopey jobs no one else wants to do, he gets.

 

So one day, they made him clean out an old, shoulder-high tool chest of drawers 'way in the back of the shop. It had numerous drawers and cubbyholes, stuffed full of miscellaneous hardware. It was filthy, and probably hadn't been cleaned out since the 1960s. He was a little peeved that he was given such a dumb job, while the rest of the employees - grown men - got to work outside, operate heavy equipment, and do cool stuff like that.

 

But he stood in front of the chest and started cleaning it, drawer by drawer. The other employees went elsewhere.

 

Probably an hour after they figured he should be done with the task, they went to check on him. He was just finishing the last drawer, and acting kind of nervous.

 

They never found out that, while cleaning that old cabinet in its out-of-the-way corner, 6'3" Patrick had found a baby mouse. Awww! So cute! He knew the older employees would crush it and kill it, or ridicule him for wanting to save it. He put it aside, in a cup, to figure out what to do with it later.

 

As he worked along, he found two, three and then four more little baby mice - the siblings! A couple of them were in a cozy nest in the back of a deep drawer. He took the nest out and replaced all the babies in it.

 

Finally, he came upon the mama mouse. He chased her all over the office 'til he finally caught her. The whole time he was frantic that the guys would come back and give him the teasing of his life. He put the nest with the babies and the mama in the back corner of an old, unused pickup, with a tarp loosely over. He was hoping that the family would be grown and gone by the time the other employees needed to use the vehicle.

 

            The only person he let in on the secret was his mom. She understood, and was grateful to have a son who cared so much about helpless little living things.

 

But not everything has worked out quite that well:

 

Patrick's boss lives out in the countryside, where he keeps all his big-boy equipment. This past winter, with the crummy economy, there wasn't much for the employees to do. So the boss kept looking around for things to keep them busy so he wouldn't have to lay them off.

 

One of those little jobs was helping the boss' elderly neighbor, about a half-mile down the road. He has one of those long, rural driveways that runs uphill to the highway, where the mailbox is. When there's ice, it's a serious hazard. The old neighbor could fall and break a hip when he went out to get his mail and paper. In fact, the boss had seen him slip just that day. While the neighbor didn't fall that time, the boss was worried.

 

So the boss arranged with the neighbor to send Patrick over there to throw sand on his driveway, all the way between the garage and mailbox. The old guy left his garage door open, with the big bag of sand right inside.

 

Patrick went over there, steamed about the incredibly simple task he was assigned to do. He could handle more of a challenge than THIS! Here he was, doing this dopey, little-boy job, while the OTHER employees got to do real, men's work.

 

Hmmph! He was feeling angry and impatient. He grabbed the big, heavy sack and sprinkled a pathway all the way to the mailbox.

 

Mission accomplished. There you go, old codger.

 

Next afternoon, Patrick arrived at work after school. All the employees were talking about the terrible thing that had happened at the elderly neighbor's house that day:

 

All of his chickens had wandered up to the highway . . . and been run over and killed!!!

 

  

 

Can you blame him? At left, chicken feed. At right, sand.

 

 

Turns out that Patrick had mistaken a big bag of CHICKEN FEED for the big bag of SAND next to it in the guy's garage.

 

He had sprinkled chicken feed, not sand, all the way up to the mailbox. The chickens had naturally followed the trail of feed, right up to the highway. So the Chicken Holocaust was HIS FAULT!!!

 

I guess the teenaged animal lover's face turned as red as a stop sign. The older employees would not stop kidding him about it. Of his own accord, he marched over to the elderly man's house, apologized, and received understanding and a warm forgiveness that he won't soon forget.

 

He was so upset, though, that he "faked sick," came home, slammed the door, and it was days before he told his parents.

 

These things happen, Patrick. Think of it as just another good life lesson to help turn you toward godliness . . . and that ain't chicken feed! †