My Boy Leroy

My Boy Leroy

by

John Dill

It was going be one of those days! After opening my eyes this morning, I squinted to find my glasses. Losing my glasses has always been a problem for me. Now, my glasses were missing again. Things were a bit blurry. I rubbed my eyes as I remembered the events of the previous night.

It was a truly strange evening. My son Leroy had taken ill. Lethargic might be a better word for it. Leroy has never been quick when it comes to moving around. He’s always shunned work of any kind. Whenever I’ve asked him to mow the lawn, his reply has usually been, “How much will you pay me?”

Sheeze!

But his laziness reached a new low last night. Shortly after dinner, I could barely get Leroy to open his eyes. It’s as if he had become so entrenched in his laziness that he had fallen into a catatonic stupor. I shook him and his eyes barely opened. This was accompanied by a moan. I raised his limbs one at a time and dropped them. They fell limp to the couch where he was laying, remote control still clutched in one hand.

I became concerned. Something must be wrong. Leroy had become too lazy.

The next thing I knew, I was pulling up to the emergency room entrance at Mercy Hospital. To my surprise there was a sign in the window saying that they were closed! What? I have never heard of such a thing. Sure enough, right below the closed sign they had posted the hours of operation. The next thing I did was to rush over to Shasta Regional Medical Center. Again, closed! This can’t be right. Emergency rooms are never closed.

Leroy remained motionless in the back seat, except for his occasional attempts to change the TV channel. Yes, he was still clutching the remote.

So I jumped into my car and began racing down to Saint Elizabeth Hospital in Red Bluff. On the way, I decided to call them on my cell phone. I got a recording saying that they were closed too! It was the weekend, and they closed at 8:00 PM. This was the craziest thing I had ever heard! How was I going to find medical care for my boy? I wasn’t sure he would make it until morning. If he became any lazier, he might stop breathing!

Stick with me. This gets even crazier.

While driving down the freeway, I had a brain flash! It might sound ridiculous to most people, but when a man is desperate he might try anything. VCA Gateway Hospital has an after hours buzzer at the front door. I knew they would be closed too, but I figured I could buzz for somebody. VCA was the next exit. I went directly to the entrance and rang the buzzer. Soon, an attendant arrived and let us in. I told the lady that it was an emergency, and after seeing my son Leroy she agreed to summon the doctor on duty.

At this point in the story I need to clear up a small detail. I haven’t told you yet that VCA Gateway Hospital is actually an animal hospital - a very good one mind you, but an animal hospital nonetheless. I figured that vets must be pretty smart. After all, human doctors have to work on only one species. Vets have to work on all the rest. And besides, VCA was the best I could do under the circumstances. Every human hospital was closed.

After describing my son’s symptoms to the vet on duty, he knew exactly what was wrong. “Oh yes,” he said, “They’ll never tell you about this at a human hospital. Only a skilled veterinarian would know how to diagnose and treat this condition.”

I waited while the vet took Leroy into one of the back rooms. He was back there for over an hour. I was nervous. Then, to my surprise Leroy came walking through the door into the waiting room with a spring in his step. The vet said he should be fine.

“Leroy,” I said with surprise, “You look great!” As ridiculous as it may sound, my son had been completely revived by a veterinarian! I had never seen him so perky!

He smiled at me and said, “I feel great now dad! Can we go home?”

As I have explained, all of that happened last night. This morning I was sitting on the edge of my bed looking for my glasses. After giving up on that, I stumbled to the kitchen table where Leroy was waiting with a smile. To my surprise, he was already awake and reading the newspaper. I don’t think I can recall a single instance of Leroy ever reading the newspaper. Not only that, he had fixed me a cup of coffee.

“Anything interesting?” I asked.

“Well cattle futures are up,” he replied.

Now that was a truly odd statement. When had Leroy taken an interest in cattle futures? I asked him where he got the newspaper, and he explained that he had walked out to the end of the driveway and retrieved it for me. A thought crossed my mind: walking to the end of the driveway involves movement. Leroy had gone out and picked up the paper - for me - without asking for anything in return. This was totally out of character for my boy Leroy.

Now here is where things began to get really interesting. Right after breakfast, I knew that I needed to ask Leroy to help with some chores. I was dreading the conversation. I have always felt that doing a few chores around the house would build Leroy’s character. But getting Leroy to actually do any meaningful work had become almost impossible. In the past, he would whine and he would argue. Invariably he would want to know how much I would pay him. And even if I could get him to go out and mow the lawn, he usually did such a lousy job that I would have to go out and do it myself anyway. All Leroy ever wanted to do was lay around on the couch and flip through TV channels.

But after the visit to the vet last night, Leroy appeared to be a changed boy. His mood seemed to be much more positive, even energetic. He seemed as though he almost had a desire to please me when he got me the newspaper. So I figured it was worth a gamble. “Hey Leroy, I don’t suppose you would mind mowing the lawn for me this morning would you?”

To my utter astonishment, he jumped up from the table and sprinted to the front door. Just before running outside, he turned and asked excitedly, “Do you mind if I trim the hedges when I’m done with the lawn?”

Holy cow! This can’t be my Leroy!

Before I could get to the front door, Leroy had already started the mower and was on his first run. He cut a perfect path, back and forth, and when he was finished he also cut the lawn again crosswise. Putting the mower away, he grabbed the edger and put a fine edge on the lawn in no time. Astonished, I stood there as he put the edger away and returned with the hedge trimmer!

I closed the door and went back to the breakfast table. Whatever that vet did the night before, it was close to a miracle. As I perused the front page of the paper, I could hear Leroy working on the hedges. Soon he was finished and the tools were all put away. I went out to inspect the mower, edger and hedge trimmer and found that Leroy had also completely cleaned each machine, and serviced them for their next use. Leroy however was nowhere in sight.

Returning to the kitchen, I looked out the rear window. There was Leroy. He was halfway done cleaning the swimming pool. He had checked the chemicals and added the right amount of each ingredient to insure the proper Ph level and chlorine content. He was sweeping down the walls of the pool too. I opened the sliding glass door and prepared to ask him about his newfound energy. Before I could say a word, he shouted over to me, “I’m going to backwash the filter in just a minute. After that, I’ll get started scraping and sanding the trim. I should be able to have the eves painted by sundown.”

Holy schemoley, I thought! I called out to him, “How much is this gonna cost me?”

“Dad,” he replied, “Don’t be ridiculous. After everything you have done for me, this is the least I can do for you.”

This can’t be my Leroy. Out of habit, I shouted across the yard, “I’ll give you a few dollars when you are finished.”

He responded, “Maybe you and I can go for a ride in the car instead.”

It was like I had hired a hard worker, and a best friend, but this one was free of charge. Leroy was busy trimming and fixing everything in the house. He found stuff that was broken that I didn’t even know about. He replaced all the burned out light bulbs, cleaned the windows and mirrors and took out the trash. This was too good to be true.

I decided to call the vet and find out what he had done to transform my son from a lazy teenage slob into a working dynamo with a strong desire to please me. As the vet picked up the phone, I explained everything Leroy had been doing that morning, and I was careful to contrast that with his normal behavior from the past.

“Doctor, what exactly did you do?” I asked.

“Well, your son’s condition is more common than you might think,” he said. “Kids catch it in school from their school yard friends, and then they bring it home. It can also be spread by watching TV, text messaging, and the Internet. Older kids spread it to their younger siblings too. If we hadn’t treated your son last night, he might have grown up to be a lazy good for nothing ne'er-do-well. It’s called LASS, which stands for Lazy Ass Son Syndrome. If you have daughters, they might marry one of these guys. In that case you would have Lazy Ass Son-In-Law Syndrome, the worst form of the condition.”

“But you still haven’t told me what you did to cure him,” I said.

“Well, that part is really simple,” he responded. “We gave your boy a total blood transfusion. But you must understand that we did not give him human blood. We don’t have any of that stuff here. You would need to go to a human hospital for that. And besides, a lot of the blood at human hospitals is infected with LASS. Instead, we transfused your boy with the blood of a Border Collie!

“You mean a dog?” I asked incredulously.

“Not just any dog,” he replied. “A Border Collie is the smartest and most energetic dog in the world. Have you noticed a marked increase in your son’s reading habits?”

“Why yes,” I said. “That explains why he was so interested in cattle futures this morning. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him read the paper. The first thing he did this morning was go out and get the paper.”

At this point, I did not tell the doctor that Leroy had in fact rounded up every newspaper on the block and placed them in a pile next to the kitchen table.

The vet then replied that I could expect that sort of high-energy work ethic from now on. He said, “Border Collies live to please their masters. They’ll work until they drop. In fact, the most difficult thing about having the blood of a Border Collie in your son’s veins is that your cats will never get a moment’s rest. Do you have cats?”

Then, I heard a loud annoying buzzer. I began rubbing my eyes trying to see without my glasses. It was the alarm clock buzzing next to my bed. I groped around trying to find the button to silence it. Finally, everything was quiet. Confused at first, I sat on the edge of my bed. It had all been a dream. It seemed so real though. But reality soon set in. It was Sunday morning and there were chores to be done. I bent over and put on my slippers and made my way toward the kitchen. Wow! What a weird dream. I guess anything can happen in a dream.

While walking down the hall, I decided to look in on my boy Leroy. There he was sleeping soundly in is bed. His room was a pigsty. I went in and shook him and heard a moan. I raised his arm and released it. It fell limp to the bed. I shook him again and he moaned, “Leave me alone.” He was a far cry from the Leroy in my dream. This one had full blown LASS.

As I sat at the kitchen table waiting for my coffee, I started thinking about cattle futures. I don’t think I have ever looked up cattle futures. That must be in the financial section. I thought of how nice it would be if someone went out and retrieved the paper for me. Hey! Maybe I can talk Leroy into getting out of bed and getting it. Nah! He’d want to know how much money I would pay him. Besides, he wouldn't do it until he rolled out of bed at noon.

I poured my first cup of coffee and sat silently. In the distance, I could here a lawn mower running. I wondered if it was another dad like me, afraid of asking his kid to mow the lawn. I thought to myself how nice it would be if my kid was like a Border Collie, always eager to please me, a workaholic without pay, just a blood transfusion away. I looked at my refrigerator door. I noticed a white and blue refrigerator magnet on it. Grabbing a chair, I sat down in front of the door. Without my glasses, I had to lean forward and squinted to read what it said. Slowly, I was able to make out the words. It was the emergency number for VCA Gateway Animal Hospital.