Happy janitors

Yesterday, I went with some friends to get some Chinese food. There’s a little restaurant at Monroe and Leonard with an unremarkable name, “China City” written in typically unremarkable Chinese-restaurant-block-lettering signage. But the food is hot and the price is right - $5.25. All you can eat buffet. Count me in. Though, as I tried to remind one of them later, “all you can eat” and “all you should eat,” are two very different things. Not that I always take that to heart. Any other day and I, too, would have gone for thirds, fourths, sevenths, whatever. But I’m trying to keep my girlish figure. New Year’s resolution or something.

Who cares about Chinese food, anyway. If you’ve been to China City, you might as well say you’ve been to First Wok and Golden Buffet and China Palace and Kowloon Abacus and everywhere else. They all make the same stuff, an Americanized version of what Americans think Chinese people eat. And, as a friend who used to fix kitchen appliances once told me, they’ve all got cockroaches. Without exception. But I don’t want to ruin your future Moo-shu pork experiences, so I’ll move on.

We talked about career things. Friend A is still in college, seven years in with another to go, and Friend B is learning that what he is doing isn’t what he wants to be doing. He’s looking for something else, with a little more purpose.

My generation is finishing college just in time to see ourselves get laid off. Lots of us are either looking for jobs or sitting in the last-in first-out position. This puts in me in pretty optimistic standing trying to start a career outside of pizza-delivery.

I’m quick to say I haven’t really felt the effects of the recession. But then I realize, oh yeah, I got laid off a year ago. I had just started my career as an associate editor, a step above coffee-getting guy. (Though, had the staff been any bigger, I probably would have started as coffee-getting guy.) And a few days before the Christmas party, the axe fell squarely on me. The pizza gig softened the blow. Living with my parents helped, too. Life said to me, go start over, this is not for you right now anyway. So I delivered pizzas and went to Africa and came home and delivered more pizzas.

As much as I write about the pizza-gig, you would probably think this is somehow central to my identity. But I don’t think it is. If your identity is based around how you spend your time, then I am first and foremost, a Guy Who Sleeps. Second, a Guy Who Delivers Pizza. And Third, a Guy Who Thinks About Sleeping. But if this job somehow goes away soon and I have to earn my money some other way, my “identity” wouldn't fundamentally change. So, I don’t think that’s who I am. I’m more than my job today. I will be more than my job tomorrow. The pizza gig is blog-fodder that happens to pay the bills.

We all live for something. We need significance, to justify our existence, to convince ourselves that we’re not bums. I guess the go-to identity thing for college kids is their career. Most people I know spent/are spending/will spend their college years trying to figure out the whole career thing. I sought my identity in my career for a long time, groaned over my major, dreaded the day I’d finish college without a clue. And here I am, holding my college degree, delivering pizzas. Sometimes it seems humiliating, and I like to be self-deprecating about it. But then I realize it’s not the most important thing about me.

What you do for a career - not terribly important. Sorry. That’s something I never learned in college. I’m inclined to make the most of my college education and its oppressive price tag, that’s why I seek a “real job” somewhere. But when I think about it, I’d be just as useful doing something else that doesn’t seem so glorious. The career is just a detail. That’s why there are happy janitors and sad lawyers. And lots of unhappy, “successful” famous people.

When you center yourself on anything other than what you were made for – careers, relationships, yourself - you’re probably not going to be happy. I ought to draw the theological parallel here that if God made us, and we don’t feel fulfilled, we probably ought to take a good look at Him to find out what we need to fulfill ourselves.

-----

(Some of my inspiration: Reading "The Reason for God" by Tim Keller)

Obama

I'm looking for a job. Thing is, I don't always want to bank on the thin slice of experience I've got. So I created this résumé:



(I blacked my address here out so no one can contact me and stalk me. Neat, huh?)

Get it? Hope and Change in place of experience?

No?

Oh, I see. You do get it, you just don't think it's that funny. That's okay.

Anyway. Job searching and snarky commentary aside, today was a big day. I'll spare you from having to read another person's thoughts on how important it is to see a black guy become the president. Not that I want to deny the hugeness or awesomeness of it... it's fascinating to see all this happen in my lifetime.

I generally try to stay away from writing politically, or having political conversations because inevitably, I end up being wrong. I wrote a bunch of stuff on my old blog about WMDs and stuff when we were going to war in Iraq. That turned out swimmingly. I've learned that however much I try to cement my political views, they still find a way of evolving. I don't just think I'm wrong. I think everyone's wrong. So I find it's best to stay mum on stuff until it's historical enough to have some consensus. Which doesn't mean I don't have opinions on things, it just means I don't care to share all of them.

So back to Obama. I am doing my best to have my opinions on him shaped not by talk radio, but by what he does as president. It's going to be a bitter, awful four years if I'm shuddering already at the sound of his voice before his first full day in office. And as much fun it is to have things bitter and awful, it's better to give him a fair chance.

And so it is, I've given him my trust. He's the president. He says he's got a plan to fix the economy, I'll hope it works. He says he's cutting my taxes, I'm going to enjoy it. The world says they like him, and I'll hope he keeps us on their good side. He says he's a Christian, I'm going to let his character support it.

I'm going to discard the Chicago politician résumé, the Senatorial voting record résumé, the Reverand Wright résumé, and and focus on the President résumé.

It's hard not to give credence to all of the hope that people have in him. Obama means a lot. He is, if nothing else, a symbol of the change people want and a chance to get things right. There was so much bitterness sent Bush's way. I guess I took offense to it because I voted for the guy. I still see him as a scapegoat for things that aren't his fault. For lots of people, he could do no right. And despite all he did wrong, he did some things right. Obama delivers a chance to get things right for all of those people who stood against Bush. So, now's their chance.

I'll let you know if my résumé gets me work. After all, it worked for Barack.

This is pizza delivery, not AAA.

Last night at work, some guy called and asked if I had a "one of those car chargers that jump dead batteries." I knew right where it was going.

I told him I didn't. He asked if anyone else did, and I said No, I didn't think so.

He told me to check.

So I checked. The other driver, Chris, was about to deliver a pizza (after all, that's what we do.) We asked him and he said no.

Phone guy asked me to drive down to him and give him a jump. I asked if he worked here, or if I knew him, because that was the only way any part of this would have seemed rational.

He said, "No, but I order from you religiously."

Now, most people don't realize this, but religiously ordering pizza from a particular establishment does not obligate that establishment to service your automobile.

I wanted to pass the buck. I told him I would ask the manager and I put him on hold.

Me: "Hey, Dave, this guy wants me to come down and give him a jump. Tell me it's illegal or we're liable or something and that I'm not allowed to."
Dave: "Who is it?"
Me: "I don't know him. He doesn't work here. He's just some guy who needs a jump. Just tell me I can't."
Dave: "Okay." He shrugged.

I picked up the phone. "We can't. We're not allowed to. We think it's illegal, and we'd be liable if anything happened." This is actually not far from the truth.

He started to tell me about his day, how he had a waterfall in his basement or something and that no one could fix that either, and some other stuff went wrong too. I don't doubt he might have had a horrible day. I felt for him a little. I told him I was sorry, and wished him luck.

And ten minutes later, my next delivery went right by his house.

So I put my sign in my trunk.

Today: I gripe about poor people who have big televisions and don't tip

I want to share a story with you. But first, I should tell you that this whole post is nothing more than my complaints about people who don't tip. So if you don’t want to read it, you can stop right now.

There is no worse time of year for the pizza delivery driver than this, when the snow falls quickly and heavily and the plows can’t keep up and people don’t bother to shovel their driveways. And it has been bad lately. With all of the winter storms and lake effect snowfall, the drifts piled up high over the mailboxes, obscuring addresses and spilling over to block driveways and hide walkways.

Oh, and the economy has been bad too.

And so it was that I found myself one night last week, on an unfamiliar street just before my shift was to end. As I counted down the house numbers, I eventually arrived at what must have been the proper address, though I couldn’t tell because there was no light to illuminate the numbers above the door. It was (at best) a modest apartment building in a poor neighborhood. I saw no driveway, no pathway, so I parked my car on the street, beside a mound of snow that peaked just below chest-level. Snow had long since found its way into my shoes and through my socks and melted against my skin, so I simply stepped up into the mound, and the light above their door flicked on, and the door flew open.

A young boy stood inside, shivering, and behind him I saw the blue glow of television, illuminating the walls and shining through the blinds on the windows. Since I saw no pathway to him through the snow, I asked if there was a back door or another way. He said nothing, only stared at me, ogling the hot bag in my hands. So I trudged over the hill and across their lawn up to the door. Inside, one of the largest televisions I have ever seen stretched across one of the walls, showing the Pistons game to the homeowners and anyone within a two-block radius.

He had been charged with the duty of delivering the money to the pizza guy, and I could see the bills in his hand. Having done this for years, I know exactly what it means when you meet a child at the door: There will be no tip. Grown-ups, at least most of them, are aware of the unwritten rule that people who provide a personal service are to be compensated by the consumer in addition to the employer. Children are not aware of this. So people who are too cheap to tip take advantage of their kids and send them to the door as sentries of ignorant cheapness rather than confess their cheapitude to another working adult.

And so, with the bill for the pizza being $12.71, the kid handed me exactly $12.71. I handed him the pizza, thanked him, and checked the score of the Pistons game on their jumbotron. He walked away without ever saying a word to me.

This was a lower class neighborhood, and the majority of the people on that block were not in the financial position to tip their pizza man lavishly. But there is no excuse to ever stiff the pizza man, unless he’s rude or obviously incompetent or has big fat rims and neon under his car. I don’t expect big tips from poor people, and I know the economy is bad. But: If you cannot afford to tip, you cannot afford to order pizza. (Unless you’re an elderly shut-in.) And if you can afford to drop $12 on a pizza when you could get one from the grocery store for $4, you can also afford to pay your driver a few dollars more to bring it to you. And if you can afford a TV visible from space, you can afford to tip your driver. And if you’re going to ask someone else to risk their life on dangerously slippery, snow-covered streets because you don’t want to risk your own, you should compensate a little more.

Me and Santa

I’m not sure I ever believed in Santa Claus. At least, I cannot remember believing in him and I especially can’t remember a moment when I passed from Santa-believer to Santa-denier. And it’s not that I would consider myself skeptical or wise beyond my years - I don’t remember ever looking down on mistaken classmates, at least those who gave him up at a respectable age. Of course, if you were still telling people in middle school what Santa brought you, I would have been happy to ridicule you.

My parents never told us about Santa Claus. They still took us to sit on his lap at the mall, which was a not-so-covert way of getting us to spill what we wanted for Christmas. One time we went to Rogers Plaza, back when people still went to Rogers Plaza, and when I met Santa I told him I had seen him crossing 28^th street a few minutes before. I was on to him.

I think we always knew that the presents under the tree were from Mom and Dad. (Probably because the tags said “From: Mom and Dad.”) And whatever shred of Santa-belief that may have conceived in me would have been quickly debunked by my older brother, with whom I shared a bedroom. He was happy to dispel rumors of fairy tales, introduce me to popular music, and write on my face with markers while I slept.

My parents always made sure we knew that the reason for the season –it should go without saying that the Easter Bunny never stood a chance in our house – was because Jesus was born, and it was cause for celebration. Dad still reads the opening chapter of Luke before we ever touch a gift. When you’re six, it’s agonizing because you know there’s a big wheel or some Legos under there somewhere and you’re dying to get at them. Now that I have all the Legos a man could ever dream of, I can appreciate it a little more. Even after I’ve heard it 23 times.

Still, I really like the Santa Claus story. There are lots of variations of it, but most of them have in common the idea of a guy, usually with a beard, who generously doles out gifts for good kids. Here’s a hastily compiled summary I gathered from Wikipedia: We call him Santa Claus, but he also goes by Saint Nick (Saint Nicholas, of Myra, put coins in peoples shoes). Or “Sinterklaas” is the Dutch variation – kids leave their shoes out for coins/candy/gifts, and leave carrots or hay for his horses (much more reasonable than flying reindeer). Then there’s Kris Kringle, which we got from Christkindel (“Christ Child”) the Austrian variation which has him as a shorter/younger person who gives gifts to the good kids and is accompanied by another guy who (yikes) beats the naughty ones or takes them away in his sack.

The good kid/bad kid gift ultimatum may or may not have been invented by parents, but I’m sure they helped give it wheels. Doesn’t matter where you live, Santa Claus/Kris Kringle/Sinterklaas/Saint Nick is an effective deterrent for naughtiness.

Beyond that, there isn't a whole lot to say about Santa Claus that hasn't already been said a million times before.

Merry Christmas,

jim

Christmas and pudding

“We wish you a Merry Christmas,
We wish you a Merry Christmas,
We wish you a Merry Christmas,
And a happy new year.
Good tidings we bring, to you and your kin
Good tidings for Christmas and a happy new year.”

What a nice song. It’s traditional, unassuming, gives a friendly and hopeful message. It’s a nice one for kids to sing, standard fare for Christmas pageants. But just as the first verse ends and the audience begins bask in the kind words and contemplate the good will bestowed upon them, the next verse begins. It says, in no uncertain terms, that the singers want pudding (and in some variations, alcohol), they want it now, or else they’ll never leave. See, you knew there were strings attached. No one offers good will like that for free. You welcomed their singing, and now they’ve essentially embarked on a pudding sit-in.

“Now bring us some figgy pudding,
Now bring us some figgy pudding,
Now bring us some figgy pudding,
And bring it right here [or, And a cup of good cheer]

We won’t go until we get some,
We won’t go until we get some,
We won’t go until we get some,
So bring it right here.”

Then, of course, they play nice and wish you a Merry Christmas again.

All I know is that if I’m making pudding-related demands, I'm aiming higher than figgy.

Chasing God

I was browsing the science section at Barnes and Noble yesterday, looking for books about brains. Deep down, I'm a nerd who happens to be no good at science. I got bad grades in all of my science classes, from jr. high through college. To hell with science. But the brain - it's cool. It's fascinating. There’s this wrinkly thing inside your head and it makes you think and feel, gives you real smiles and fake ones for photographs, remembers names and places and directions, keeps your heart beating, helps you swerve to avoid accidents on Tuesday nights when the roads are slippery and people run red lights. The brain gives you wonder, wonder about life and people and how your brain works and – and God.

As I was looking for brainy-related enlightenment on the shelves at Barnes and Noble, one book caught my attention because I saw the letters G-O-D. And since I happen to know Him, it piqued my interest and I picked it up.

The crossroads of God and science are fascinating. I don’t travel them very often, but it’s an interesting place. This book, however, was called “God: The Failed Hypothesis. How Science Shows that God Does Not Exist.” Imagine my elation at finding a book about my creator, and the ensuing dismay at learning it was about how he isn’t. Doesn’t exist. Period. How you write a whole book about something that doesn’t exist, I don’t know, but this guy – Victor J. Stenger – seems to have done it.

I guess I always thought that if and when someone finally proved that there’s no God, there would be a lot of media coverage and lots of red-faced Christians. And Jews. And Muslims. And some very satisfied atheists and some relieved agnostics. I guess – if his proof is real - we just haven’t heard about it yet.

To make a good evaluation of the book, I would have to read all of it. But like I said above, I'm no good with science. And I'm not exactly sure how nature can be used to prove that something above nature (in other words, super-natural) doesn't exist. That's why I said, "to hell with science," because science, if it's used to deny God, is probably headed exactly there.

On the back there was a quote from Richard Dawkins about how great the book was. Part of it said, “Stenger drives a pack of energetic ferrets down the last major bolt hole and God is running out of refuges in which to hide.” It struck me how much effort people put into proving there’s no God, and how important it is to them to do so. They have to chase Him out of His hiding places. I guess they think they’ve got Him on the run or something.

Dawkins wrote one of many God-debunking books that has come out recently, his called “The God Delusion,” which I didn’t read (yet). And I didn’t read much of Stengers book. If I ever took either one of them on in a debate, I’m sure I would get schooled. And then I would go home and read my Bible and pray and go to bed.

Atheism isn’t new. People have always found reasons to object to God, and I understand that. There’s injustice in the world and God, it seems, remains invisible. History and the present are full of examples of hypocritical Christians and a church that did some nasty things. (Though, to be fair, Maybe God’s not invisible because there are lots of Christians fighting poverty and hunger in His name, and it never made sense to me to judge the merit of something based on those who do it wrong - its most off-base and hypocritical practitioners.) So I don’t blame people for objecting to God. I don’t agree with them, but I don’t blame them.

What I can’t understand is the vehement opposition to God from people who have decided He doesn’t exist.

I am an evangelical Christian. I believe God created the world, sin wrecked it, and that we’re reconciled only by Christ’s perfect life, death, and resurrection. I believe that when we accept that reconciliation, we spend eternity with God. If we reject it, we spend eternity without Him, the experience ranging from things still being broken to things being absolutely horrifyingly awful. You won’t blame me for trying to spare people from that.

But if God isn’t there, as they believe, then there probably isn’t much purpose in the universe. Unless you make some up for yourself. So I can’t understand the concern atheists have for Christians believing what we believe. Why the crusade to convert me? To help me out of my ignorance? Sounds like evangelism to me.

She was a good woman

Grandma’s funeral was Wednesday. I am slow to blog. I guess funerals aren’t necessarily things you blog about. Nevertheless…

I learned a lot about Grandma at her funeral. Just as I was growing up and beginning to realize that she was an invaluable window to history – my history, family history, world history – her age began to take her mind. One of the miraculous things about her, though, was that when her mind was going, her body stayed strong. Throughout her whole life, she almost never got sick. She had pneumonia once. She beat breast cancer in her old age, too. But she was spared lots of the other physical ailments that come along with getting old.

Grandma never did her part to keep the apothecaries in business. Most old people, it seems, endure a daily cornucopia of pills and capsules and tablets and elixirs and ginkgo biloba to keep themselves breathing for as long as possible. Grandma lived 96 years without them. I don’t know her secret; I hope it’s genetic.

A long time ago, she ministered in a women’s prison in Wisconsin, leading Bible studies and church services. One of the inmates attacked her once, beat her severely. When Grandma was healthy again, she went back.

When she was a child in Russia, the Bolsheviks took over. Grandma told stories, multiple times, about how they came and took her dad’s watch. When he protested and insisted it was his own, they told the family they “didn’t even own the leather on their shoes.” The communists, she knew, could give you a little but had to take everything first. They promised the people a feast, and when her neighbors all brought food, the soldiers piled it up and poured fuel on it and burned it in front of them. She never took anything for granted. She worked hard her whole life.

Her faith was intertwined in every story my mom and my uncles told. She shared it, taught it, lived it.

She was a good woman. We're proud of her, proud to know her and to love her, to call her mother and grandmother. She left a great legacy. I know she rests in peace.

Grandma

Mom called yesterday, asked if I could bring her Grandma’s dress. It was hanging in the rafters above the dryer in the basement. I told her I would, that I would bring it right then. I took it down, brought it to my car. It’s green with little white dots and a frill around the neck. It’s plain, but it’s nice. It’s the one she’ll be buried in.

Mom was sitting by Grandma’s side when I got there, holding her hand. Grandma was asleep, breathing hard with her mouth agape, looking thirsty. Her skin was loose and her cheekbones sharp, her eyes were closed and dark and sunken back just a bit. She did not look well. On the wall were pictures of her and her kids, her face full of smile and life, just the way I want to remember it.

I wonder why the sheets are white, always white. So bland and plain. I wonder why people who are on their way out can’t die with something a little more aesthetically pleasing. They have white sheets in hotels and nursing homes and hospitals, and I think it's because these are places you just pass through. They aren't home.

Mom points me to the book where visitors have kept a log of Grandma and her condition. My cousin Julie wrote that she was already gone, already with Jesus, her body was just waiting to run out of fuel. I liked the way she said it, I think she was right.

Ninety-two years ago, my grandmother was four years old, living in a German settlement in Russia. An evangelist came and held a rally, preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ. When he came to her, he said, “What about you, Natalie?” She knew, at four years old, that she wanted to live her life for Christ. She accepted him that day. Not long after, the evangelist was martyred.

And she lived her life for Christ, knew this wasn’t her home, looked forward to the day she would see her savior. She escaped the communists in Russia, came to the United States. She met Adolph Hunt and married him and they raised five children, made sure they knew the Gospel, too. My mom was one of them, and she passed her faith along to her kids.

Years ago, my grandma was diagnosed with dementia, and slowly her brain failed her, and her body began to fail, too. She went into Hospice care a few weeks ago, and a few days ago it became clear she was close to heaven.

Yesterday, I sat with mom and held her hand as she cried. She has cried a lot lately as she has waited nervously, watching her mom go, wondering when it would be, dreading her departure but awaiting her release. I held grandma’s hand and kissed it, said good bye to her, wondered if it would be the last time.

I drove away, went to work, went out with friends from high school, and as we went our separate ways in the middle hours of the night, my dad called. He told me they’d gotten a call from the nursing home, that Grandma had taken another turn, and that she would probably not make it through the night. I wondered how they knew, how they could predict that. They were going to see her, to say good bye. I told him I would go, too.

When I got there, it was 2:15 am and Grandma was asleep, breathing slowly. Mom and dad were there, along with Uncle Jim and Aunt Bonnie. Mom was at one side, holding her hand and crying, and Uncle Jim was at her other side. We sat for a while, quiet, watching her breathe, waiting and wondering, knowing that it was time for her to go. The pauses between her breaths grew longer and longer. The nurse came and closed the curtain.

At 2:30 this morning, with family at her side, her body stopped working. She breathed her last breath and went home. She waited 92 years for it. And now, she's free.

Why the Detroit Lions must go 0-16

I really, really want the Lions to go 0-16 this season. And it’s not like I’m just lusting for a trainwreck, with some sort of poke-it-while-it-dies morbid curiosity. I have legitimate reasons.

First, if you don’t follow the NFL, know this: For the last thirty seasons, NFL teams have played sixteen games each season. No one has ever lost all sixteen (though before the sixteen-game era, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers went 0-14). A few have lost 15, and a few more have lost 14. But the Lions are very, very bad, and they might just be the first to lose all sixteen. And I for one, really really really want to see them do it. I might write them a letter.

There are obvious reasons why a fan would, at this point in the season, want to see their team lose. The most obvious and beneficial is that each year, the NFL feels sorry for the most awful teams and typically gives them the first pick of the college players. So if the Lions go 0-16, we’ll get to see them grab a promising player, give them lots of money, and firmly dash their hopes of Super Bowl glory.

And as for doing something no one’s ever done - it’s always fun to see your team break new ground. We’d be pioneers – of suckiness, but pioneers nonetheless. We’d make history. We’d become the yardstick for awful teams. In the future when teams are pretty bad, the debate will be, “Yes, they’re bad, but are they 2008 Lions bad?” Think of it this way: It’s an epochal change. Right now, it’s an impossibility. If we can pull this off, we’ll live in a post-0-and-16 world. In an 0-and-16 world, anything can happen. Including, maybe, such an outrageous thing as the Lions making the playoffs.

And the only way that can happen is if the Lions somehow hit rock bottom first. For now, things have been bad, but they’ve always been able to get worse. We’ve been a 2-14 team. Twice, even. And the fans have always been able to say, “It could be worse.” Going 1-15 would be bad. But it still wouldn’t the wake-up-in-the-gutter moment we need to turn things around. And the only way things change is if we get a season full of losses. Imagine: A whole season, a homogenous batch of losing. Perfection.

Fans have been hoping for this for a while, the point at which someone realizes what they’re doing isn’t working and hasn’t for some time, and maybe they need a new approach. I don’t have any suggestions for that. I don’t run football teams. I just watch football and hope my team wins, wait for drama and shoot-outs, 70-yard touchdown passes, fumbles picked up by linemen and chugged into the endzone, defenders clinging to his ankles. And someday, the playoffs. Or maybe a Super bowl.

Maybe 0-16 gets us there. Or maybe we’re mired in the mess for a few more decades. I dunno. But I can hope. Hope. Maybe Obama can fix them. For now, though, to not go 0-16 would be a disappointment. This just becomes another losing season like the ones before where we can say, it could be worse.