Chalk One Up for the Good Guys

His eyes dared me to move. I wasn’t taking another step forward, he knew it and I knew it. I had followed him this far, but we had come to a point where one more step would mean disaster.

Jackson asked if he could sit with Brianna for the 5th Sunday afternoon devotional. I told him to ask Brianna’s mom, who said yes. So, off he went, with his Dora the Explorer coloring book and crayons. We were second row from the back, far right end and Jackson was one row up, on the far left end. Just as our new intern began his talk, I get hit in the arm with a Dora coloring book. Jackson had gotten up, walked around behind the pews to hand me his book. Apparently he was finished coloring. He ran, yes, ran back and sat. Then, I saw him get up again, this time to bring me his crayons. I took the crayons and told him to go sit down or he would have to sit with me. He went and sat, although not for long. He had missed one crayon, the brown one, so he brings it to me. But when he gets there he wants his book back and wants to go back again. I put him next to me, and tell him no, but as I’m collecting crayons, he grabs the coloring book and breaks for it. He stops behind the back pew and we make eye contact. I get up, and as I walk toward him, he steps back away from me. I walk calmly and deliberately, not running, to minimize the disturbance we’ve already created. I step forward, he steps back until he is in the aisle even with Brianna’s pew, third from the back mind you, facing the back of the auditorium. I am just behind the very back pew. There are six, maybe eight feet between us.

In my mind I hear the music from “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” and things begin moving in slow motion.
With my finger I motion for him to come to me. He stares back, motionless, cold, confident. I return the same stone cold look, but he can sense my fear. I know exactly what will happen if I take another step, and he knows that I know. If I move, he runs. It’s every church going parent’s fear. One day the kid breaks free and runs to the front of the church. But I had an ace in the hole. I had made swift eye contact with a fellow deacon, Kenny Wayne Arrington, one pew behind Jackson. He saw what was happening and was standing by to make the grab. Finally, sensing he was caught, Jackson lightly tossed the Dora coloring book onto the floor toward me, sort of as a peace offering. I knelt to pick up the book, and then being a possessive 3-year-old, he moves to pick up the book as well. I move quckly and firmly take his hand and walk him back to our seat where within about 2 ½ minutes he is asleep in his mothers arms.

We lived to fight another day.