We were driving home from one of our first dates, when all of a sudden, he yelled, “Stop!” and jumped out of the slow moving vehicle. First of all, I don’t like the dark, and second, I don’t like the dark on dirt roads in the middle of nowhere. So, I locked my door and checked all the mirrors trying to see what this crazy person was chasing. Suddenly, I heard a thud on the back of my car and my now husband began yelling, “Open the trunk!”
Okay, rewind. He just jumped out of the car, in the dark, in the woods, caught whatever it was and now wanted to put the mystery creature in my trunk. Nope. Not happening.
“What is it?” I yelled.
“It’s a beaver. Now open your trunk.”
Did I mention I was driving a Kia Rio? My car lived in town. On a concrete driveway. Beavers didn’t belong in cars that drove on pavement. Beavers belonged in ponds and swamps; and for that matter, what in the world would we even do with a beaver once we got it out of the trunk?
“DON’T PUT THAT BEAVER IN MY TRUNK. LET HIM GO!” I yelled back at him. “Why do you want a beaver, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Because it’s cool. Who else can say they caught a beaver?”
I quickly reached around and manually locked all of the other doors and just sat there shaking my head from side to side. I didn’t want him getting any bright ideas about sliding that nasty beaver in the backseat or trying to subdue him in his lap. After a few minutes of thumping and thudding, he finally gave up and came back to the side of the car. Making sure the beaver was free, I reluctantly unlocked his door and let him back in.
My husband and that beaver taught me a valuable lesson that day: sometimes it is okay to lock the doors.
We all have those unwanted beavers, in the form of people, who come into our lives and they are just bad for us. They are aggressive, mean, violent, manipulative or just plain old dramatic. They throw negative words and attitudes in all directions and rub us raw like a piece of sandpaper. These people are often sources of temptation and lead us back into old habits and struggles. Nothing good comes from having these folks in our lives.
The good news is, though, we don’t have to let them back into our lives. We have a choice! These beavers have no business being there and we can take a stand for our sanity and well-being by simply saying no. We can lock our doors, shake our heads, and do what we know is best for our lives and the lives of our family members.
Just because a beaver shows up doesn’t mean we let him. Use common sense, people, and lock your doors. Lock your life. Lock your trunk. We don’t have to let them in.