This is a follow up to a photo I posted previously called Barn Door. I grew up there. Going in and out of that barn, up the stairs and into the loft with my sisters. We posed for Mom’s camera the same way my kids did for mine. But Daddy didn’t like us playing in the loft. He thought it was too dangerous.

This was not a typical barn. It wasn’t filled with horses or cows or any other animals except for the occasional stray cat that made its home there.

The barn housed all of Daddy’s tools. The chainsaw, drills, handsaws, the sling blade, hoes and rakes. His dad’s tools were there, too. In an old wooden tool box. Ladders and paint and his saw horses and old coffee cans filled to the brim with nuts and bolts and nails. Everything and anything he didn’t want in the house.

I followed him as he worked around the yard one Saturday afternoon but he stopped me before he opened the barn door.

“Do not come in the barn. There are wasps’ nests and I may stir them up. Stay outside.” Daddy said.

I waited a minute but I went in anyway. He didn’t realize I was right behind him when he moved an old fold-up bed out of his way. Within seconds, I had yellow jackets swarming around me. He picked me up and rushed me outside. He swiped several yellow jackets off my back and arms and carried me inside the house. I was stung seven times. I’m sure Daddy was angry with me but I don’t remember it. All I remember is him taking tobacco out of his cigarettes, balling it up, pressing it onto each sting, and covering my stings with bandages. It was supposed to take the pain of the sting away.

But nothing could take the sting of my embarrassment away. I was ashamed I hadn’t listened and sad I’d disappointed him.

From that day forward, I listened to Daddy because I knew he meant good for me. I listened. But I didn’t always obey. I wanted more than anything to please my parents but missed the mark a lot of times. I lied and sneaked out of the house. I smoked and drank and had guys over when I wasn’t supposed to. I went places I shouldn’t have gone and did things I shouldn’t have done. When I was caught my parents would sit us down and talk with us because there was usually an “us” when I got into trouble. Mostly the “us” was me and my little sister. Sometimes they talked angrily at us. Daddy raised his voice wondering why we would put ourselves in these foolish and sometimes dangerous predicaments. But even so, it was always done in love.

I never doubted that. Ever.

I realized pretty early into my troubled days that the fun of it wasn’t worth the hurt and disappointment I caused my parents. Because I loved them and I wanted to make them proud.

How did they do that?  How did they make me care about honoring them and making them proud?  I’m not sure.

But I remember the day I was stung by seven yellow jackets.

And I remember I could have avoided it if only I had listened to Daddy.

^1-2 Listen, friends, to some fatherly advice;
    sit up and take notice so you’ll know how to live.
I’m giving you good counsel;
    don’t let it go in one ear and out the other.    Proverbs 4:1-2 (MSG)