The Easter Outing

Hear the story read by the author.

In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. As a special treat for Easter this year Sunday School teacher Karen Winslow planned to take her class, the “Guppies,” on a field trip to a petting zoo.

She recruited Kevin Boyer, whose four-year-old daughter Mary was in the Guppies class, to drive the church van and assist in chaperoning. Karen assumed – wrongly – that Mary would behave better if her father was along on the trip. Kevin wasn’t anxious to spend the morning with seven preschoolers, but on the other hand it didn’t seem any worse than sitting through another of Pastor O’Donnell’s extra-long Easter sermons.

By the time they were ready to leave, Kevin was already suffering from a headache. Mary and his other daughter, Suzie, had gotten up an hour early to find out what exotic concoctions of sugar, food coloring and high fructose corn syrup the Easter bunny had left in their Easter baskets. For some reason this process was accompanied by wild screeching and running about the house. Kevin yelled repeatedly for the girls to “keep it down,” but apparently whatever the Easter bunny mixed into the candy also impaired his children’s hearing.

As the van made its way from the church to the edge of town, many of the occupants’ thoughts turned to God on this holy day.

“Dear Lord,” Kevin prayed, “please clear the streets of traffic and grant me green lights so we can get to the stupid petting zoo quickly and I can take a nap in the van while the kids play.”

“Heavenly Father,” Karen prayed, “please make Kevin slow down so we don’t get in an accident.”

“Dear God,” Mary prayed, “please don’t let Mrs. Winslow see me eating my chocolate eggs.”

Mary had smuggled a dozen chocolate eggs into her coat pockets that morning in direct defiance of her parents’ instructions to only eat one piece of candy and leave the rest on the kitchen counter until after lunch. She knew it was risky to enjoy her contraband in the packed confines of the van, but temptation was overruling her good sense – as it usually did.

She retrieved a single candy egg and quietly peeled the foil from the chocolate that was now a gooey blob from the warmth of her pocket. She slipped it into her mouth, smiling in satisfaction at her stealth. Disobedience made the candy extra delicious.

“Mrs. Winslow, Mary has chocolate!” Sierra Smith shouted from the seat behind her.

“Do not!” Mary protested. But the soft chocolate had left incriminating splotches on her fingers and lips.

“Empty your pockets, Mary,” Karen instructed.

Mary reluctantly produced the stash of chocolate eggs.

“If she brings candy she’s supposed to share,” Sierra pointed out.

“Normally that’s true…” Karen started to say. She didn’t get to finish the thought. The Guppies descended on Mary like a school of piranhas. In no time the chocolate eggs were gone, two thirds into the children’s stomachs and one third smeared across their hands which were now distributing it to various surfaces of the van.

Karen tried in vain to calm the feeding frenzy. Then a loud BANG silenced the children.

The right rear tire of the van had blown out. The momentary quiet was quickly filled by high pitched screams. A second later the children joined Kevin in his screaming.

Kevin managed to steer the vehicle over to the side of the road. Kevin and Karen both exited the van to examine the flat. Karen called for a tow truck to change the tire. “They’ll be here in forty-five minutes,” she informed Kevin. “It’s a holiday.”

Kevin eyed the van which was shaking from the chaos of the wild, screaming beasts inside. “Guppies” seemed like a less and less appropriate name with each passing minute. “We have a spare,” he said. “I’ll change it myself. You watch the kids.”

Karen also eyed the van. “Why do you get to change it? I know how to change a tire. You watch the kids.”

“I think watching kids sounds more like your job.”

“Why? Because I’m a woman? That’s sexist!”

“Okay, okay,” Kevin said. “Let’s flip for it.” He produced a coin and Karen called heads. It came up tails. Karen sighed and returned to the van while Kevin got the spare tire out of the back.

Kevin whistled while he loosened the lug nuts on the flat. It helped him drown out the screams and bangs from inside the van.

The last lug nut proved extremely difficult to loosen. Kevin had to stomp on the lug wrench with his foot to get it started. It finally budged a fraction of an inch. Then another. He grabbed the wrench with both hands and eased his weight onto it.

The lug nut popped loose. The wrench banged down onto the pavement, smashing Kevin’s fingers under it. Kevin did a little jig, clutching his hands between his thighs and expressing his pain verbally with a colorful and detailed string of profanity he usually reserved for watching sports.

He froze when he realized the noise from the van had stopped. He looked back over his shoulder and saw seven preschoolers and one fuming teacher staring out the window at him.

Kevin grinned sheepishly and told Karen that for safety reasons the kids should probably get out of the van before he jacked it up. He suggested she take them on a nature walk. Karen thought that was a good idea.

Kevin finished changing the tire while Karen pointed out a variety of ants, grasshoppers and weeds to the kids on their nature walk through the vacant lot across the street. Ten minutes later they were on their way again.

They reached the petting zoo and turned the kids loose on the animals. Kevin and Karen flopped down on a bench to watch. “Thank you, Lord, for getting me through that ordeal,” Kevin prayed silently.

Then Sierra got bit by a duck. She shouted out the same string of profanity that Kevin had used earlier, recalling it with remarkable precision.

Kevin looked at the sky. “Very funny,” he said.


(In loving memory of uncle Gene.)