have a good reward for their labour.
For if they fall, the one will
lift up his fellow…”
- Ecclesiastes 4:9-10, Bible
“Let’s get going in the next 15 minutes.”
I was working on my weekly blog…one of those weeks where it
was only Thursday and it was nearly finished.
I appreciate that when it happens.
Her voice broke into my head a little like a daydream
interrupted by an unexpected wakening.
For a second or two, the continuity of the moment was discordant.
My first thought, “Next 15 minutes? What the heck are you talking about?” That’s
what I thought; what I said was, “Okay hon, where was that we are going
again?”
The deal…
Molly had gotten a meal coupon for the ‘Fox & Hound’
Sports Bar/Restaurant and thought we should take a break sometime this week for
lunch. In fact, I had known we were
going to do this, but my mind was elsewhere and the whole event had gotten away
from me.
The ‘Fox & Hound’ is a place where the University of
Missouri Alumni meet for afternoon football or basketball games when the teams
are playing on television. We are alumni
and have made a game or two.
We don’t get to sports bars often, but they almost always
intrigue me. There are huge television
screens with different games, sports interviews and sometimes music videos all
playing at the same time. The thing so
strange is with everything showing on the screens, there is NO VOLUME! “No volume” would not be exactly true;
because there is always music playing that requires talking above normal
conversational tones. For the most part
people eat finger foods – chicken wings, burgers, fries – drink beer and talk while
watching their favorite teams play. If a
large enough group’s team scores or has a good play, loud cheers erupt, the
volume of which is in direct proportion to the amount of beer they have been
drinking!
As it turns out; Molly noticed just before leaving the house,
the coupon had expired two days earlier.
I wasn’t too keen to make the drive because of the writing, but I have
learned over 35 years of marriage, small concessions often pay off in
significant familial dividends. So, with
outward enthusiasm and a somewhat sense of internal reluctance, off we went.
The place…
We were running a bit late, but made it just in time for
lunch. I expected a packed and noisy
restaurant, but as it turned out the place was pretty empty…a pleasant surprise. Taking a high-4 top table with stools we
could rest our feet on, our waitress showed up, asked us what we were drinking
and headed off to bring them back. By
the time she returned we were ready to order.
“What’s your name?” I asked as she finished taking Molly’s
Fish & Chips and my Pretzel Bun roasted turkey sandwich requests.
“Kalifa,” she said.
“How do you spell that?
With a ‘C’ or ‘K’,” I asked.
“With a ‘K’,” she replied with a smile, and was off to the
kitchen with the order.
Lunch was excellent, and I was beginning to think Molly had
made a good decision to eat here, even though I had not really been ‘in the
game.’ Kalifa was great; replenished our
drinks without having to ask, each time adding a winning smile. There was little doubt she knew her job well.
When she brought the check, and we paid the bill, I asked
her, “How long have you been working here?”
“Oh, about a year,” She replied.
She was pretty young, I was guessing somewhere in her early
20s. “What do you want to do with your
life?” I continued.
I often ask young people just to get a sense of the kind of vision
they have for their lives.
While Kalifa had been more than pleasant as a server, when I
asked her this question, she simply radiated.
“I want to be in casting for a career,” she literally
bubbled.
She had gotten her college degree at Arizona with an emphasis
in Arts, Media and Entertainment, and her dream was to identify talent and cast
them into production work. Following an
internship in casting at the Black Entertainment Television (BET) network in Los
Angeles, she knew this is what she wanted to do with her life. Working in the sports bar? Well, one does what they have to do…right?
Providence, you have
got to love it…
It just so happens, we have a friend who owns a casting
company in Los Angeles!
I told Kalifa about our friend and provided her with the
contact information. Her excitement was tangible
as I wrote down the email contact.
She said, “You know, I was going to leave work early today
because it was slow. Something made me
stay to take your table.”
While I am not the sharpest tack in the box, it began to
dawn on me there was a reason, more than just having lunch at the Fox &
Hound, afoot here. I had been distracted
by my earlier writing and wasn’t ‘listening.’
Molly, on the other hand ‘was’ and here we were in this cosmic moment of
confluence!
Quick review…
Molly felt strongly enough about
going to lunch that she put up with my, “Okay hon, where was that we are going
again?” comment. If I thought I was
being clever…she knew I hadn't been listening!
We got there just in time for the
end of the lunch hour.
Kalifa was going to leave work
early, but decided to stay on.
Her desire in life was to work in
casting.
We knew someone who was extremely
successful in the business.
If you follow this blog at all, you know this is the sort of
thing that adds an almost inexpressible joy in these meaningful and unexpected life
experiences.
It is often the bigger things that seem to grab the
attention…a paper published…an opportunity to speak somewhere... organizations
in which to serve…and yet, if I were to be honest, it is events like this
one with Kalifa that I find the most gratifying.
The bigger things require scheduling and time set aside for
preparation. Kalifa, on the other hand,
could NEVER have been planned. There are
simply too many moving parts…too many unknowns…too many mysteries of the
universe to consider.
Yet come they do…
They come in the unexpected…in the openness of saying yes in the moment,
reminding us that we are not alone and are all part of the fabric of life and
humanity. Perhaps they come because we
need to be reminded how both fragile and robust life is…I can’t say.
What I can say is this; sometimes these impending and
unknown experiences require a team effort.
When we don’t have our antenna tuned to events in which we are supposed
to participate, we might need a nudge to get us to listen.
“Let’s get going in the next 15 minutes.”
Thanks Moll…
- ted
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