Burn

Or

Couldn’t decide which picture to use today - they both apply.  Read on and you’ll see why.

Did you ever do something that caused an unintended calamity?  This is one of those things.

When I was about eight years old, the little boy – he was five or six - from across the street came over and “helped” me as I lubricated my bicycle.  I put “helped” in quotation marks because he was really just getting in my way.  All he managed to do (besides slow me down) was get filthy.

When I was done, I did something I had learned from watching my dad, something I had done several times before.  I soaked a rag in gasoline and used it to clean the grease, grime and oil off of my hands. Then I soaked another rag so the kid could clean himself up.

The gasoline didn’t bother me at all, but within a few minutes the little kid was screaming, running in circles and waving his arms like he was trying to fly.

His arms were bright red and beginning to blister.  His mother grabbed him and took him to the emergency room where he was treated for second-degree burns on both arms.  She never let him play at my house again.

It was all perfectly innocent.  I had no idea that a fair-skinned blue-eyed blond would react the way he did.

Even so, over sixty years later, I’m still overcome with remorse when I think about the poor little guy.