I Got Your Back

ART: "Daily Prayer" By Wak

Check This Out...

There was a 9 year old boy named Hakim, sitting at his desk and all of a sudden, there is a puddle between his feet and the front of his pants are wet. He thinks his heart is going to stop because he cannot possibly imagine how this has happened. He has peed his pants!

It's never happened before (at least not in school), and he knows that when his boys find out, he will never hear the end of it. Never! When the honeys find out, they'll never speak to him again as long as he lives!

Hakim believes his heart is going to stop; he puts his head down and does what we all do in such situation... he prays. More importantly he prays this prayer: ''Dear God, this is an emergency! I need help now! Five minutes from now, I'm in the mud!"

'He looks up from his prayer and here comes the teacher with a look in her eyes that says he has been discovered. As the teacher is walking toward him, a classmate named Shaniqua is carrying a goldfish bowl that is filled with water. Shaniqua trips in front of the teacher and inexplicably dumps the bowl of water in the boy's lap. The boy pretends to be angry but, all the while, he is saying to himself... "Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Jesus!''

Now all of a sudden, instead of being the object of ridicule, Hakim is the object of sympathy. The teacher rushes him downstairs and gives him gym shorts to put on while his pants dry out. All the other children are on their hands and knees cleaning up around his desk. (Of course, if there were any children like the child I was, I'm sure somebody is somewhere laughing about this whole thing.)

The sympathy is wonderful but, as life would have it, the ridicule that should have been his has been transferred to someone else, Shaniqua. She tries to help but, they tell her to get out. "You've done enough, you klutz! Fall back!"

Finally, at the end of the day, as they are walking home from school, Hakim walks over to Shaniqua and whispers... ''You did that on purpose, didn't you?' Shaniqua whispers back, ''I peed my pants once too.'' He smiles at her and says... "Good lookin' out, buddy."

Of course, that was my spin on an old fable but the point is, that's a true friend... a person that will sacrifice themselves to save you. Do you have a true friend like that? And, more importantly, are you a friend like that yourself? Who has your back and who's back do you have? Whether we like it or not, we are our brothers and our sisters keepers. Just a nice thought for the weekend...

Peace!

The Maverick of All Bloggers
(and former "disgrace to the negro race")