The Rake

I was five that summer, the only summer we lived in the First Street house in Norfolk. After supper one evening, Mom and Danny and I piled into the car with Dad to visit a junkyard of some kind, before it got dark. I loved it when Dad said, "Let's take a ride," because we were sure to see something new, or have an adventure of some kind. And, on the way home, I was always hopeful that we would stop at a Drive-In for an ice cream cone.

I don't remember if we rode in the blue, '55 Ford, or if we had the red, Rambler station wagon by then, but I know there were no seatbelts in our car. I probably rode in the back seat, cruising from one window to the other, or leaning over the back of the seat in front of me to talk to Mom. Danny may have been sitting in Mom's lap, or next to her on the front bench seat.

I don't know what Dad was looking for at the junkyard, but he and Mom got out of the car, and he told me, quite firmly, to stay put. So, I did what I always did when I had to wait in the car. I looked out the windows until there was nothing more to see. Then, I crawled onto the front bench seat, where I undoubtedly sat in the driver's seat, pretending to drive, until that, too, became boring. When I looked out the window again, I could see Mom, holding two-year-old Danny, and Dad, standing a ways away, talking to someone I didn't know. What was taking so long?

I opened the glove compartment, hoping to find a stick of gum, or a pen and some paper. I spent several minutes sorting through everything that had accumulated in the glove box, which, oddly enough, never contained any gloves. I looked at the colorful Nebraska map, then carefully refolded it before I put it back where it belonged. I counted the few pennies that had found their way to the bottom of the compartment before returning them to the glove box. I drew for a while in the little lined notebook that Mom always kept there in case she needed it. Then I put that away, too, and gazed out the window again. What was taking them so long?

I sat in the front passenger's seat and leaned out the open window, calling for Mom, but she must not have heard me. So, after sitting there a few more minutes, I opened the door and stepped out of the car.

Danny and me

That summer, I usually wore shorts and a coordinating crop top, or a skimpy sunsuit that tied at the shoulders. I was barefoot, of course, or wearing rubber thongs, now known as flipflops. (It was a sad day when the underwear industry appropriated the name of our favorite footwear for their scanty panties.)

I decided to take the shortest possible way to get to the spot where Mom and Dad were still standing, with their backs to me, conversing with the man who owned the junkyard. I quickly clambered over and around the piles of junk scattered all over the place. Then, it happened. My foot slipped, and I stepped down, squarely on a rusty, old rake lying tines up, right in my path.

The rake was dull, so the tines didn't penetrate too deeply. I was able to separate my foot from the rake by myself, but I let out a yell that alerted my parents to my miserable predicament. Dad scooped me up, and someone found a semi-clean rag to wrap around my foot so I wouldn't bleed all over the car as we drove home.

There was no time to stop for ice cream that night. Instead, I had to soak my foot in a tub of Epsom salts and warm water. The next morning, Mom drove me to the doctor's office for a tetanus shot. She reminded me, more than once, that I wouldn't have been hurt, and I certainly wouldn't have needed a shot, if I had simply obeyed Dad and stayed in the car.

You've probably heard the commandment that says, "Honor your father and your mother, that it may go well with you, that you may live long on the Earth." (See Deuternomy 5:16.) Unfortunately, many children, like me, have had to learn some things the hard way; parents don't make rules just to be mean. They usually have some good purpose in mind, such as their children's safety and well-being. There is a reason that commandment comes with a promise, "that you may live long on the Earth." When kids obey their parents instead of making foolish decisions, they are much more likely to survive their childhoods unscathed.

These days, many people have decided that the Ten Commandments are obsolete. I guess a lot of adults will have to learn the hard way that God, out of his tremendous love for us, has given us some rules for our own protection and well-being. In fact, many of the most basic laws of our land are modeled after the original Ten Commandments, whether or not those same commandments can still be posted in the schools and courthouses throughout our country. What a tragedy it will be if these commandments are discarded!


One of (the Pharisees), a lawyer, asked (Jesus) a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” Matthew 22: 35-40