allmostrelevant

Out of the blue my grandmother gave me a McDonald’s gift card for $20 dollars. She said I was a good kid and should have it, but I didn’t do anything. Have you ever gotten something you know you aren’t supposed to have? Not in a guilty sense, like I shouldn’t have all these tweenage pop albums in iTunes, but legitimately having something that you know isn’t yours. I was walking in a mildly run down part of downtown when a man with a cane hobbled towards me, “You ain’t afraid to talk to a black man, are you?”

“No.” I crossed the street because the red hand turned into a little walking man.

“Let me catch up to you.”

“I’m just about to leave.” My car was 20 steps away. I never turned fully around to address him, but kept a safe distance even though I didn’t feel threatened.  He stopped and then I stopped. His cane leg was swollen to three times its normal size. He had three dollars and an expensive disease. He was hungry. I said I didn’t have any money, but remembered the McDonald’s gift card. It’s better for me to not eat McDonald’s anyways. I gave it to him and drove home… I kind of want McDonald’s now.

When I was young my family owned one fifth of a boat, so every few weeks we’d take it out and go sailing for a half-day mini-vacation. We’d bring snacks and soda for refreshments, but I was only allowed to drink a soda if I helped out, in other words; earned it. Soda became the reward. I would sip it and relax because I knew I did my part, and it was vacation; at least that’s what I learned. At home I would do the yard work and have a soda, do my homework and have a soda, set the table and have a soda. I started having them more frequently so I stopped earning it, but it still felt like a little mini-vacation. I would sit down to work and then have a soda and not do anything because I already got the reward. I must have earned it. I forgot how to work hard and drank more soda, wondering why nothing ever got done.

A man worked for the engineering department at an oil company. His job as an adviser was to guide the rookies into professionalism. Once his mentees had learned all they could from him they would step  out and assume a loftier position elsewhere with a larger salary.  The company would lose one engineer every year, but would foresee this coming and hire another so productivity was never effected. This went on for many years until the adviser had aged well enough, and his own advice was being reciprocated around the country by his previous mentees, now advisers themselves. On his last day he stared at his empty desk and chair before walking away. His boss, and friend spoke with a sense of content and rest. “Don’t worry; we’ll find a way to fill it.”

The adviser patted his friend on the back. “We lose one every year, but I never thought it would be me.”