Make New Friends but Keep the Old, One is Silver & and Other's Chrome

My son and I were hustling that morning, trying to get out the door and onto the road. We piled into the truck about five minutes later than we intended but I still had a fighting chance to get the kid to school and myself to work on time. That’s when I noticed that I was nearly out of gas.

Yeah? So it’s gonna be like that, universe?

I used the petrol fumes remaining in my tank to coast into a gas station right off the highway. As I pulled up to the pump, I noticed there was a biker gang off to the side of the parking lot. I pointed them out to my boy.

“Pretty cool bikes, huh, Jono?”

The kid began pointing and staring at a motorcycle he particularly liked. The large, bearded men in leather watched as he pointed and talked. The biker dudes looked none too pleased.

I jumped out of the truck and started to fill the tank. We were really running late now. In my periphery, I noticed one of the bikers starting to walk toward me.

Side note: I’m very aware in situations like this. I try not to judge people by their looks and I generally assume that if I’m not bothering people they won’t bother me. But still, you have to be ready to defend yourself and your family, right? Anyway, that’s how I see it. And Batman agrees.

The guy came around from behind my truck and said, “Excuse me.” 

It looked like I was about to get another chance to make an unexpected friend! Jono has a way of doing this to me. Like the time I walked into a pizza place and told the kid at the counter that I had an order for "Wasserstein." Jono piped up and mentioned that there also might be an order under the name of "Skywalker." That's a good way to make a new friend. Just an excellent ice-breaker.

Jono also likes to ask people at the grocery store things like "Do you know something cool about dinosaurs?" They usually don't. We help them. Friends!

Or there was the time Jono insisted that we stop and give money to a homeless man on the street because, come on... he doesn't even have a house! He needs some money! (That one was actually super convicting. Thanks, Lord, for a kid who is often holier than me.)

There are a lot of people to meet out there in this big world and Jono is usually more willing to meet them than I am.

Anyway, back to the scowling biker guy. He was pretty scruffy-looking (though not quite of the “nerf herder” variety), wearing a worn leather vest and chaps. He was also pretty big. Some of his buddies were even bigger. He had noticed us pointing at him. He definitely wasn’t smiling.

“Yeah?” I said.

“I noticed you have a kid with you,” the man said, nodding to the cab of the truck. 

“Would he like a temporary tattoo?”

He handed me a sweet B.A.C.A. tattoo sticker.

“Thanks!” I told him. “That’s awesome!”

The guy walked back to his buddies. I had to grin. I love it when people turn out to be as cool as you hope they are. As we pulled away from the pump a few minutes later, my son rolled down his window to scream “THANK YOU” at the top of his lungs. The bikers still didn’t smile. But they had definitely made one kid happy.

Okay, it was time to get my little hooligan to 2nd Grade.

Let’s ride.