Billy and I were watching a movie. OK, I was watching. Billy was texting with one hand and playing Squash Monster on his tablet with the other. Squash Monster is a game where you squash squash and other vegetables. Billy loves it, mostly because his mom likes to ask, “Did you get your vegetables today?” Then he can say, “I got ’em!”
Suddenly the game froze. “The Wi-Fi’s too slow,” Billy said. “I’m bor—”
“Shhh!” I warned him. “My dad will hear you.”
At my house, saying you’re bored is Dad’s cue to pull out the Big List of Chores. That’s bad for everybody. It’s bad for me because I end up mowing or weeding the flowerbeds. By the way, don’t mow a flowerbed. I learned that the last time I was “bored.”
But it hurts my dad, too, because the chore list is heavy. Dad has a bad back. His front isn’t so good, either. (Sorry, lame joke.)
Anyway, I never say that word at my house because of the list. I also never say it because there’s so much to do. To quote my good friend Timmy Hawkins, “We have a meat computer in our heads!” And I agree. God gave us brains to think up awesome, crazy adventures. How can I ever feel bored if I use that?
By the time Mom got home, Billy and I had covered the driveway with fun ideas in sidewalk chalk.
“Hey Mom, can we get a jet pack?” I asked.
She read the driveway and shook her head. “You know,” she said, “I think it’s safer for you two just to be bored.”
“Shhh!” Billy and I said together.
Since Mom vetoed jet packs, Billy and I tried our next best idea: chicken rodeo!
Mrs. Fox, my neighbor, raises chickens. Several birds got out of her pen recently. Nobody knows how they escaped. They could’ve squeezed through the fence. Or, and this is a crazy theory, they could’ve walked out when I left the gate open after feeding them. We’ll never know.
Billy and I found them wandering the yard. Forty minutes later, we had wrangled the chickens back into their pen. We didn’t feel bored anymore. We were too busy gasping for air. Chickens should enter track meets. They’d beat us all!
Mrs. Fox was happy, and we felt great. That’s what happens when you fill your summer with adventure. Whether you play sports or chase chickens, it’s healthier than video games. It’s more fun, too.
“Thank you, boys,” Mrs. Fox said. “How can I repay you?”
I glanced at her garden. “Do you have any giant squash?”
