Ode to a 20-yr-old

At the Nowcare I am at I do a lot of DOT (Department of transportation) and occupational physicals . This means that anyone that needs a job involving driving or anyone who needs a work physical comes to me and we fill out a lot of paperwork. It mostly involves blue-collar men, ages 25-65, who drive trucks. Suprisingly, yesterday I got a form for a 20yr old male, which is sort of young. Immediately, I looked over the chart and thought to myself, "Great, he is going to hate having a slightly older female do his hernia check!" But, you do what you have to do. So, I proceded to realize it was a work physical and application for a local company. I noticed his interests were hockey, shooting off rockets, and remote-controlled cars....I don't think they come more "boy" then that. I go in the room and this kid is bright eyed and chatty. We laughed about the complex paperwork that could have cleared him for the Marines although it was just for an internship in engineering at a local company. He said, " I am just a sophomore, I don't know what they think I will be doing since i have to be cleared to use a respirator. I don't know anything!" We had a good laugh at the thoroughness of his forms. They wanted a drug test (normal to ask), blood counts, lung tests, urine samples, social security, first pet's name, etc...you get the picture

I wish I could give you the picture...imagine a happy go lucky, slightly nerdy, Minnetonka-like kid, with blond hair and glasses, slightly akward around me, a chemical engineer major, sort of really straight-laced and innocent looking. He had no idea how precious he was, in a little brother sort of way, and how I was anticipating the awkwardness of certain parts of his physical exam.

For instance, he failed his pulmonary function tests because they are really hard to perfrom correctly. He got a low score, and I said, "that's probably the only low-score you have ever got in your life." He said, "yes, that's true" and laughed. I told him how to breathe more correctly for the testing and he said "Man, i shouldn't have quit the choir". Funny. Just funny. Later, in my excellent judgement, I decided the "male exam" could be skipped since he was only going to be doing an internship with the engineering department, not demolition duty. At one point during the exam I was examing his abdominal and back muscles for the form (why they want to know how strong his abs are is beyond me) and he was a little slow in the exercises i needed him to do. He sort of laughed awkwardly and says, "Oh, i guess I shouldn't have worked out yesterday....I am sort of sore." It was funny. He was embarrased. Poor kid. When I checked his patellar (knee) reflexes he says upbeatly, "Oh, i love this part!" I mean, the guy was so nerdy, but it was just so refreshingly funny. He essentailly hopped off the exam table when we were all done and bounded into the chair.

So, all that to say, I left the room with my heart warmed and a smile on my face. His innocense was absolutely refreshing. His spirit was contagious and his sense of ease in his own skin was encouraging. God is so kind to brighten our days with the small things. He knows how to make us smile. And, I sure hope that his internship goes well...and that he doesn't have to use a respirator mask.