In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. Eight months ago church members Carlos and Carrie Lopez had their first child, a beautiful boy named Scott. Recently, Scott learned to crawl. This elicited a variety of emotions in the young parents.
Both were of course delighted to see their child reach this milestone. But in Carrie this delight was mixed with dread over all the new dangers her precious baby would now be exposed to. Carlos and Carrie were living with Carrie’s parents, Del and Karen Winslow. Minutes after Scott first pulled himself three feet forward to reach a favored toy, Carrie raced to the store to acquire two large bags of baby-proofing devices.
Del was quite amused watching Carrie spend the next few days ensuring that every corner, door, drawer and liquid was covered or locked down. He followed her around telling stories about the trouble she got into when she first started crawling back in the days before all those fancy safety gadgets. His intention was to reassure her that everything would inevitably turn out okay, but the tales of Carrie’s young brushes with injury had the opposite effect on his daughter.
Carlos’s delight was not tinged with anxiety so much as exhaustion. His job while Carrie was baby-proofing was to wrangle Scott manually away from any danger. Once Scott realized that he was now able to move about the house unassisted he took maximum advantage of the skill. And Scott turned out to be a natural speedster. It was all Carlos could do to keep up with him.
That Sunday the Winslow’s trooped off to church. Del was in the choir and Karen taught Sunday school. Carlos, Carrie and Scott took their usual place in the back pew, which had extra room to accommodate strollers.
Now that he could crawl Scott’s patience for being strapped into a stroller or car seat was extremely limited. Once the little family was settled and the service started, he began to get fidgety. Carlos took Scott out of the stroller and held him on his lap, hoping that would calm the little guy. It did not.
As the offertory began Carlos allowed Scott to crawl up and down the pew. Scott was pleased with this solution but Carrie was not. She elbowed Carlos and hissed, “What are you doing? He could fall off.”
So Carlos set Scott down on the floor. It seemed a reasonable idea in the moment, but one he would quickly regret.
From little Scott’s perspective, the carpet stretched out in a broad plain populated by people’s legs and roofed by the pews. It looked like a fascinating place to explore. And so that’s what he did.
From Carrie and Carlos’s perspective, their baby had just vanished under the pew in front of them.
Carrie immediately dropped to her hands and knees. But she was too slow – Scott was already three rows away. Carrie wriggled after him, but while little Scott could easily crawl under the pews Carrie had to follow on her belly. Even so, she banged her head several times.
Carlos meanwhile scrambled out to the side aisle to pursue his child. He got there just as head usher Ralph Billings was coming by with the offering plate. They nearly collided, then did a little dance to maneuver around each other. Though the delay was only a few seconds, it allowed Scott to extend his lead by several more rows.
Carrie almost caught Scott when he stopped to investigate Missy Moore’s purse, which was sitting on the floor. He pulled the purse over, spilling out the contents. Missy looked down in time to see Scott crawl after a silver pen that was rolling toward the front of the sanctuary. A moment later Carrie lunged out from under the pew, her fingers missing Scott’s heels by an inch.
Carrie felt several sharp pricks in her hands and arms. She lifted them to discover she’d been skewered by thumbtacks that had spilled from Missy’s purse. She looked up at Missy and asked, “Who carries thumbtacks in their purse?” Missy sputtered, still trying to comprehend exactly what was happening down there under the pews. Carrie didn’t wait for an answer. She scrambled after Scott, ignoring the pain.
Quite a few other members of the congregation were startled when a baby crawled past their legs, followed soon after by a slithering young woman. Some inadvertently stepped on Carrie’s fingers, though miraculously none impeded Scott’s progress in any way.
Once the offering was collected, the congregation stood and sang the Doxology as the ushers brought the plates up the center aisle to the altar. Out in the side aisle Carlos had gotten parallel to Scott and could see him crawling relentlessly forward in the middle of the pews.
Carlos jogged ahead to intercept the baby. He selected a pew to make his move just as the congregation was sitting back down. With no time for elaborate explanations he climbed over eighty-six-year-old Donald East. But he tripped on Donald’s cane and fell face first into Seventy-year-old Henrietta Miggins’s lap.
“While I never!” Henrietta hissed.
Carlos mumbled an incoherent explanation as Scott cruised past between Henrietta’s legs. Carlos made a belated grab for the child, but missed. He scrambled back out to the side aisle ignoring Henrietta’s indignant glare.
Normally the ushers left the offertory plates on the altar, but today was a communion Sunday and the altar held the bread cubes and thimble size glasses of grape juice for the ceremony later in the service. So they took the offering plates with them as they returned to the back of the church.
Next up on the program was special music. As it happened this Sunday’s special music was a solo performed by Del, accompanied by organist Walter Tibble. Del came out of the choir area and stood at the front of the chancel. At his nod, Walter began to play. Del closed his eyes and sang, unaware that Scott had just crawled out from the front of the pews.
Little Scott looked up and saw grandpa singing. Scott liked grandpa. So he headed that way.
Scott struggled up the two steps to the chancel. Of course by this point the entire congregation could see the runaway baby. But nobody quite knew how to respond to the situation.
As Scott clambered up the final step to the chancel he became distracted by the shiny gold trays holding the communion sacraments. His attention span was pretty short at this stage of his mental development. Scott crawled to the altar, grasped the crisp white cloth covering it, and pulled himself up to standing. Standing unassisted was a skill he had not yet mastered.
Scott didn’t weigh much, but he weighed enough that when he tugged on the cloth it started to slide. And as the cloth slid it brought the communion trays to the edge of the altar. The congregation gasped in unison at the impending disaster.
Del heard the gasps and opened his eyes. He knew he was a good vocalist but couldn’t see any reason why he should elicit such a reaction mid-song. When he discovered everyone’s gaze was fixed on a point behind him, he turned around.
The communion trays tipped precariously above Scott as he wobbled, clinging to the altar cloth. Without missing a note, Del stepped back and scooped the baby into his arms. Then he calmly stepped forward again and launched into the next verse as Scott squirmed and gurgled and tugged at the collar of Del’s choir robe.
When the song was over Del handed the infant to Carlos and Carrie who were waiting anxiously at the edge of the chancel. Carrie hugged Scott tightly, a tear trickling down her face.
Del chuckled to himself as he returned to his seat. “New parents,” he thought. “They panic so easily.”
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