Bottlebrush Boys

   We were late for church. We were in that sandwich of time, tightly pressed between Sunday School and the Prelude. It is a short, sweet and delicious intermission. It’s light. It’s free. It is a deep breath and a wild sprint across Saint Augustine grass outside the sanctuary. St. Augustine grass is spongy and springy. Like a small town, it can be a cushion or a catapult. It uplifts and envelops simultaneously. 

   This St. Augustine patch that Kenny and I were running on was wet. Maybe our pants cuffs would dry before we went home to meatloaf and football. Maybe not. Ahead, concrete and red rugs would easily erase this revelry and deliver us to reverence inside.

   The blobs of fuzzy red bottlebrush flowers caught our attention. The thin branches bending down with their itchy green leaves looked like a spectacular finish line tape for the late but victorious sprinters. Surely those tender red flowers would explode ceremoniously as we crashed through the finish accompanied by the muted but rising organ sounds inside the church. 

  We were late, but felt redeemed by our rush. The foyer just beyond the bottlebrush would wrap us in forgiveness and the deacons would greet us with obligatory looks of disapproval paired with a wink of solidarity with boyhood. 

 

   We blasted through the tilting red flower finish line. Bottlebrush flowers attract butterflies, bees and hummingbirds. They also handily collect the droplets from rain or sprinklers. The soaked flowers left their mark. Our heroic entry would be with wet stains on our church pant zippers, which no one would attribute to an evergreen shrub.

   Entering the foyer, the deacons did not, in fact, lift us up in brotherhood. We were idiots, seemingly in need of diapers and also late. We found a back-row padded pew and endured the service thinking about sprinting away on that green carpet outside. The preacher asked everyone to turn to page 229, and everyone sang:

   Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power?  

Are your garments spotless?

  Are they white as snow?

Are you washed in the blood of the lamb?

   It felt as if everyone in this flock turned to snicker at us as we endured that hymn and the remaining 2400 seconds of waterlogged torture. 

   

After our extended repentance, we burst out of the sanctuary doors into the arms of Florida sunshine. The St. Augustine carried us away with the feeling that this Sunday afternoon held endless wonder and mirth. Amen.