“TURN HIM LOOSE, SON”

 

            Some events are forever etched in your mind. I was ten years old. My family was very poor during my childhood. We did not think much of it, because most people in rural Alabama were poor during the 1950s and 1960s. It was “city folks” that had running hot water, inside bathrooms, and fancy gas space heaters.

            We had an old pot-bellied stove that required wood. One of the joys of winter was being outside in the woods cutting firewood. Daddy always told us that cutting wood would warm you twice—you got hot cutting it, and then you got warm standing beside the stove!

            We did not have a pickup truck, but daddy did have a McCullough chain saw from his logging days. My uncle had an old 1936 Dodge pickup, and together we would cut firewood.

            One firewood-cutting moment is forever etched in my mind. It was one cold fall day, when we were going down an old dirt road in route to the woods. There was not a cloud in the sky. My cousins, brothers, and I were huddled behind the cap of the pickup, staying out of the cold wind. You could see your breath. It was every little boy’s dream to be in the back of a truck headed to the woods. We hoped that we would see a deer, turkey, or some other animal.

            On each side of the dirt road were pastures surrounded by barbed-wire fences. The woods were far across the fields. Suddenly, my uncle and dad started pounding the rear window and pointing to the left side of the truck. We expected to see a cow, bull, or horse running in the pasture, but it was a little gray squirrel. He was coming at us as if a hound dog were hot on his trail.

            The timing was perfect. He crossed the road under the pickup. We heard a thud. The little gray squirrel emerged from under the rear of the truck, spinning round and round. My uncle came to a squeeching halt. My daddy said, “Catch the squirrel and we will get your grandmoe to fix some fried squirrel with dumplings!”

            I jumped out the bed of the pickup and caught that little gray squirrel. Now, remember, I was ten years old, and I forgot that the teeth of a squirrel will crack a very hard hickory nut. A hickory nut is hard to crack with a hammer, but a squirrel has very little trouble cracking one. I also forgot that little gray squirrels run over by old Dodge trucks go crazy.

            When I caught him, the squirrel bit the knuckle of my left index finger. Everyone was so excited, hollering and screaming, and they never heard me yell at the top of my lungs nor did they see the blood flying.

            I pried the squirrel from left finger, and he immediately bit the knuckle of my right index finger! I screamed again, and the blood flew from a second finger. By this time, my cousins, brothers, uncle, and daddy saw the action. My daddy hollered, “Turn him loose, Son.”

            What daddy did not know was that I was trying to turn him loose. I realized that I had not caught the squirrel—he had caught me! That little fellow was excited. Think about it. He had been running from something, he was run over by a truck, he was spinning round and round, and now a ten-year-old boy was trying to catch him for supper. He was in the fight of his life.

            I screamed back to Daddy, trying to convince him that I was trying to let the squirrel go. Daddy wanted to pry him loose, but he had already gone through two fingers, and, if I had let him, he would have gotten the other six fingers and two thumbs.

            Daddy searched the pickup, found a large bolt, and knocked the squirrel on the head. Daddy flung out his pocketknife and performed a major operation on the squirrel, cutting him from my right index finger.

            We loaded back into the truck and went to cut a load of firewood. I wrapped my fingers in old rags until we got back to my grandparents’ house. My fingers began to stiffen. We soaked them in kerosene and later in Epsom salt. We could not afford to see the doctor. I had never cared for fried squirrel and dumplings, and I surely did not after that!

            I learned a valuable lesson that day, and I share it at drug awareness conferences. I learned to be careful what you catch, because it might catch you. Addictions start with that first time. Some drugs you cannot stop taking, and you become hooked. That which controls you shames you.

And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit. (Ephesians 5:18, KJV)

 

Do you have something that controls you and shames your testimony? Explain.

Do you know someone who is controlled by sin? Pray for him or her.

Have you ever caught something that you could not let go?

Prayer: Father, You set all creation in motion. Your work is perfect. You know what will give us joy and peace. Help us to respond to the leading of Your Holy Spirit.