Sweat Bees and armpits

Proverbs 6:27
Can a man scoop fire into his lap without his clothes being burned?

I love this time of the year, mainly because I’m a real big transition guy. I love the transitional seasons because they aren’t too hot or cold and there’s always this “change is in the air” feeling (literally). Anyway, today has been exceptionally nice, and so after lunch Sydney and I stole a few moments in the hammock outside reading books and playing with the new kittens. If nothing had happened beyond that, it’s pretty close to a perfect afternoon, well, except for the kittens because I’m not as big on cats as I am on transitional seasons. Thankfully, though, our time got even better, thanks to a sweat bee and the wonderful way the 5 year old mind works.

At some point after the second book and before Sydney got down to push me and the kittens, I dozed off until Sydney woke me up talking about a bug by my foot. I looked down and saw it hovering near my big toe and I told her that it was just a sweat bee. That got her attention, because she followed it up with a question about why it was called a sweat bee and was it because they made people sweat. Sometimes, the questions alone are enough to crack me up! I told her no, they don’t make you sweat, but they do like sweat (specifically, the salt in the sweat, but that would open a whole new can of questions, so I went the simple route).

After I had successfully swatted at the bee with my feet until it was gone, Sydney moved her hands from behind her head to her side, and I asked her if she was comfortable. “Yes,” she told me. “I’m just closing my armpits in case that sweat bee tries to get in them.”

I’m always amazed at the simplicity with which children live. Their logic is so flawless, and I want that again. Seems that the older we all get, the more complicated we want to make things. But if sweat bees like sweat, then it just makes sense to close your armpits, doesn’t it? If doing “A” leads to “B” and “B” is bad, then you change “A” right? Sure, if you’re 5. But all of us “smarter” big people will spend all kinds of time, energy, and money to try and make “A” lead to an acceptable “B” or, at the very least, we’ll get counseling to deal with “B” instead of simply closing our armpits and never having to deal with the undesirable outcome.

It’s time that we stop dancing close to the edge of the things in our lives that are producing unwanted outcomes. It’s time to stop wasting our resources on trying to invent clothes that won’t burn so that we can keep scooping fire into our laps. It’s time to close our armpits so the sweat bee can’t get in there.

Not only will our lives be more pure and more free, but it’ll probably smell a lot better, too.

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