Day 7

 

The Government Field Trip

 

"It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way."

 

Proverbs 19:2

 

It started out as an innocent school field trip, but it almost ended in a tragic accident. My high school required that you go on some sort of field trip for you government class. This trip was not with the whole class on a bus but was to be done on your own time in the summer between your junior and senior year and you were to observe some official government function. A lot of kids went to a local traffic court to observe a few cases (maybe their own), but my friends and I had bigger plans. We went to downtown Houston for a murder trial.

 

My best friend's dad worked downtown so we rode with him into town and he parked his car on the top floor of a parking garage. The dad went to his office and we went to the courthouse. We sat and watched the case of this guy for whom the future did not look good. We doodled pictures of the defendant with a rope around his neck and had to be told by the judge to be quiet when a witness said something that was pretty funny and wasn't aware that he had done it.

 

On our lunch break we quickly grabbed a bite to eat and went to Foleys, this huge department store. I bought the coolest rope braid belt to wear with my button fly bell bottoms. I was very pleased with my purchase.

 

When it came time to leave we went to meet my friend's dad at his office and then on to the parking garage to get the car. The dad, his son and another friend started walking up the ramp to get to the car several stories above us, but 2 of us decided to go by a quicker route. My friend's dad tried to discourage us from our plan, but it looked to be an adventure to us so we ignored his advice.

 

The parking garage had valet parking if you wanted to pay extra and the parking attendants had this cool conveyor belt elevator they rode.  The conveyor belt had foot holds and hand holds that you used. You put one foot on the foot hold and reached up and grabbed a hand hold and up you went straight up an elevator shaft. At the top the conveyor belt just flipped over and you could get on it going down, so while some were going up the conveyor belt others were on the backside going down.

 

I'm pretty sure that this device was for employees only but since it looked cool I wasn't going to let that little detail stop me. So, with one hand gripping my shopping bag with the precious rope braid belt I stepped on to the conveyor belt and reached up with my other hand and grabbed the hand hold. My friend got on below me and up we went. It moved faster than I thought and I confess I was enjoying the ride and not paying enough attention to what was going on. As I neared the top I suddenly realized I had a problem.

 

I was facing the wrong direction to get off and I needed to somehow quickly turn around and step off the conveyor belt before it passed the top floor and then flipped over and started heading down. By the time I processed all my options I didn't have any options, I had missed the top floor. I was up in a metal building on the top of the parking garage that housed the motor for the conveyor belt and the conveyor belt was about to flip over and head back down. That meant I could do a one armed hand stand all the way down or, most likely, plummet several stories down the elevator shaft.

 

I was not a big fan of either of those options so, as the conveyor belt flipped over, I got off on a beam the motor was mounted on in the roof of the metal building. I hollered down at my companion below me to quickly get off because it was a one person perch on that beam.

 

He got off and I tossed down my shopping bag with the cool belt to him because the belt was expensive and I might need to wear it to my funeral. I also needed both hands. I figured I could lower myself from the beam by my hands and do a swinging dismount like it was some kind of high bar routine. It was a bit dangerous but preferable to calling the fire department to rescue me.

 

It took a few minutes to sum up the courage to do this so my friend's dad arrived at the top of the parking garage just in time to witness my flying dismount. He never told my parents what happened. He did have heart trouble a few years later and I probably contributed to that.

 

The Bible says, "It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way." (Proverbs 19:2) In my youthful zeal I almost missed the way permanently. The biblical model is for younger men to learn from wiser, older men and not to rush foolishly into things they don't understand.

 

I never rode one of those conveyor belt things again. Years later my rope braid belt was mistakenly put in a bag of clothes that went to a homeless shelter. It's a shame too, because it sure would look cool with my suits on Sunday mornings and now I have to come up with another cool belt for my funeral.

 

Upon Further Review:

 

Read 1 Peter 5:1-5

 

• What is the responsibility of the elders of the church?
• What are the young men of the church supposed to do?
• How is pride an enemy to both the elders' and the young men's responsibilities?