Lawn Care and the Existential Crisis

Yesterday i had the pleasure of kneeling beside my 7-year-old brother in law (BIL) as i wore raw spots in my fingers trying to start a Weed Eater. I’ve come to realize (even within the realm of my handicapped mechanical abilities) that no matter how many times a person were to yank the pull string, if the machine does not want to start it is not going to start. Simple as that.

Even still, life frustration and general stubbornness allowed me a few extra pulls (just enough to notice that i had worn the outer layer of skin off of the inside of my fingers. Ergonomics can kiss it.) When i sat back down on my heels in apparent surrender my BIL decided it was time to bring all 7 of his years of wisdom to the table.

“You tried praying for it Eric?”

Without looking up I kind of smiled to myself, not because it was cute, but because of the fix-all we’ve made of prayer, and simply said, “Nope. I haven’t.”

Realizing that time was a-wasting he then proceeded to matter-of-factly inform me that, “Well lets do that, then. C’mon.”

Again, I stayed still for a moment, contemplating the implications for a 7-year-old if God doesn’t answer his prayer to start the unholy weed eater. Concluding that sooner or later in his life my BIL will realize that not all prayers are answered the way we want just because we ask, if in fact they are answered at all or even if an Answerer exits, i said, “Ok, lets pray.”

I laughed a little to myself as he knelt beside me and closed his eyes. In a span of 2 minutes my existential dilemma of belief and faith was being metaphorically lived out over an unresponsive weed eater. Knowing that the appropriate Modest Mouse song playing in my head wasn’t really going to start coming across the small work radio, I said a pretty basic but honest prayer, we both said Amen and then, with a deliberate pause i grabbed the machine and gave the pull string one more tug.

Nothing.

I laughed again (maybe cause its easier and less embarrassing than crying) and thought, yep, that just about figures.

My BIL on the other hand wasted no time with his response to our apparent answer of No.

“Well, i guess we’ll pray to the devil then. Dear Devil in Hell . . .”

I went into instant big brother shock and sharply blurted out, “NO. MAN. No. We can’t be doing that. God may not answer, but i’m not sure we want to head down that path.”

The kid just kind of looked at me quizzically and then simply said, “Well if we pray to the God in Heaven and that didn’t work then i thought we’d pray to the Devil in Hell.”

I’m sure i rambled off some cliche excuses as to why we don’t do that, and how its wrong even though God didn’t answer, he must have his reasons, etc, etc.

However, the more i stood over that infernal weed eater and thought about the simple logic of my 7-year-old comrade, the more i was impressed. There was no hate or bitterness associated with his appeal to the “other team.” There was nothing more than an alternate means to accomplishing a goal. If i had to classify this philosophy i think that it would be called Humanism exploiting contemporary Christian spirituality. God and the Devil are just resources to be used to accomplish our will. I think my BIL just created a new religion with out meaning to.

Of course, the only loophole in all of this is that if there is no God then the Devil’s existence also comes into question. But a 7-year-old needs a few constants to hold on to when navigating his desires.

And i need something to hold on to so that the past 28 years of my life don’t seem for naught. Even if its the devil.