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Sunday 9th September 2012
Do you believe that Jesus died for your sins?
 
So where am I? Oh yes, we got the boys' bikes in the boot of the car and headed for The Royal (Heysham), meeting Helen and Stu there. Whilst waiting for . . . something . . . probably waiting for the food to arrive (which wasn't that long, considering), the boys were getting a little impatient and so started running around the beer garden, which was fine, 'cos we could see them and they weren't bothering anyone. M**** and I thought, "Hmmmm, maybe we should fetch some crayons and paper,"
so I went to the car for said items. An old-ish (early 70's) man was leaning on the fence there, watching the boys run about. We briefly exchanged a few words and I went to the car. No crayons. Just one of those semi-automatic pencils (you know the kind, consisting of about four or five inch-long plastic cartridges with a pathetic bit of lead at the end; one runs out and you push it back in at the end to encourage the next cartridge to emerge from the front . . . too much detail). Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, so I went back to the beer garden. Man was still leaning on the fence. I was then subjected to way too much information about 75-year old Graham (that was his name and he was actually born in 1937), 
the salient points being: it's the mothers who wield the discipline in any family, his mother (who had orange hair and green eyes; thanks, Graham, the details help) was some kind of theatrical singer type, his second wife is in prison . . . erm, okay . . . "She works as a chaplain there. I'm just off to get her now." All kind of harmless stuff. He was just watching A******, R****** and this other boy playing around, going on about discipline and such-like. Just as I thought he was leaving, he suddenly says, "Do you believe that Jesus died for your sins?" and I was a bit taken aback. He might have well have told me some some piece of information about his bowel problems, my reaction would probably have been the same. "No, well, I don't . . . 
They do [pointing at A****** and R******]" "But why not?" "Well, erm . . . I like to think that I'm a bit more . . . " I struggled for words at this point . . . dogmatic? Pragmatic? Critical? Phlegmatic? None of them seemed right. "But he died for your sins. How does that make you feel?" "Well, like I say, I don't believe any of that, but they do and so does their mother, so, erm . . . you know?" "But you should be thankful for the fact that he died for your sins! You've got a lot to be thankful for!" "Should I? Really? But I am thankful. I'm thankful for my two sons and, erm . . . " and then, fortunately, he laughed and got into his car. Odd. As M**** always says, "How do you manage to attract them?"
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