Hooked

"Accident prone," the mother said to me as she rolled her eyes.
"Come here, boy, let me see it," said the aunt to her young nephew, still a ways off. The boy stood back, no emotion on his face, just one hand covering his bottom lip. She urged again and he dropped his hand. "O Shit!" exclaimed the aunt.

Ten minutes earlier we had found two young boys standing on the side of a lake. The smaller one was frozen holding his fishing pole as the older one gingerly held the fishing line at his mouth. We jogged over to help. Rachel went looking for his mom way down the beach. I grabbed a slimy knife from their bucket and cut the line as close to the hook as possible, so afraid I would slip and tug it deeper into the soft flesh. It was a big hook and the end of the worm was still on there. I patted him on the back.

Dynamite!

"Hey! Good morning!" I called through my rolled down window as I passed the third driveway on my block on the way to work on Tuesday morning. It wasn't my neighbor, but my neighbor's friend who was walking out to his truck to get something. The two (my neighbor and his friend) are inseparable. They're always in the back yard hanging out, drinking, gardening, pushing kids on the swing, and lighting dynamite (more on this later).

"You got the wrong guy," he muttered. For a cheery guy, he seemed pretty upset.
"Huh?" I knew this person. We threw the frisbee together at the block party.
"You got the wrong guy. You can't come over here all buddy-buddy after calling the cops on us," he grimaced.

Paper Sack Sermon

When the morning service at Salvation Army* finished, all kinds of people greeted one another. Rachel and I were instantly caught up in a number of friendly conversations and encouragements. Out of the corner of my eye, two kids approached me holding three paper sacks filled with something; all I could see were heads of grass waving out the tops like flags. Written on the outside of the sack in red sharpie were two words: God created! "This is for you," the boy gleamed, holding one up to me. "We made them in Sunday school." 

The boy and girl were obviously siblings and also the only ones present today for Sunday school. The teacher? Their mom. The next youngest person in the room was probably Rachel, then me, then their mom, and then all the others, averaging in their late sixties. But they were a warm bunch, visibly stripped of pretense and riches and glad to gather together for Sunday worship.

At the beginning of the service, the leaders led the church in a prayer, "God bless Brendan this