corporate exchange to intimate connections

I work in a drive through. Don’t let the fact that it is for Startbucks fool you, I am indeed working in a drive through. And while that sweet headset song of beeping, and humming and amplified big truck exostpipe often remind of times when my parents were actually proud of me, I am typically distracted by the looming question of whether I am under or overqualified for this position. All that to say, I have actually stumbled across a few absolutely beautiful things while working at Starbucks…well beautiful and interesting…mostly terrifying.

It was a closing shift when she came through the drive through. She ordered a drink, I took her money and asked how she was. It was at this point that her eyes turned into two tiny pools and her face to a muddy red earth color. She had just found out that her mother was in the hospices. Apparently this is the place where people go to die. She never fully cried in front of me but I knew that if I were to touch her or anything she’s probably just melt away. So I gave a few free drink cards and listened for a while.

She asked me if I was a believer in Jesus Christ. Rather then waxing poetic about how the church had failed me and how most nights I’d rather fantasize about being cradled in the arms of a Mos Def- Simon Pegg- John Linnell- Andy Richter superhuman then praying to my ceiling I replied, “uhh I’m working on it,” which wasn’t a lie. I then mentioned that I attended Biola to take some of the heat off. She looked relieved but I was still looking over my shoulder. She could probably sense my anxiety, then most likely mistook it for the Devil, because at that point she asked me my name.

“Jamie,” I smiled.
“Well Jamie, I’ll be praying for you. And never let Him out of your life, always keep Him in your life.”
“Well mam’ I don’t think I could get him out even if I wanted too,” after she found no humor in this I figured that this woman had never danced with Anne Lamott’s Jesus Cat.

That was the second time in a week someone had said they’d pray for me. When this happens I usually feel insulted at first, then bad. Bad for a lot of reasons the main being the whole...not knowing what the hell I believe in any longer. Better yet, knowing that I think I believe in God but having absolutely no reasons or support or logical standing for thinking that (If it smells like faith...). Feeling bad is also the result of becoming so apathetic toward something I once loved so much. Apathy is insulting. Hatred is terrible, but at least it’s a feeling. A plaguing feeling such as love...or intense like. But apathy...apathy is rolling over, apathy is a text message, it’s a quiet slap to the jaw, masked and made okay by books entitled, “He’s Just Not That In To You.”

When I got to work the next week the woman had left a gift for me. A tiny Max Lucado book, some Easter chocolate, and a card assuring me that she was praying for me and reminding me to let Him IN this Easter. Again, at this point I should be a little insulted. But I’m not. She was loosing her mother so she did what many women would have done, she became a mother. This woman clearly was the type who was always taking care of others and happened to run into me the night where the one person she learned all that from was dying. A few free drink cards and a listening ear seemed to lend this woman the distraction she needed from the horrific evening ahead of her. A night spent with her dying mother. She may have interpreted our meeting as an act of God. As the Divine taking from her one life but letting her be the salvation source for another. If she needs all that to get through burring her mother, then she can most certainly have it.

This all sounds very cold of me, I know. Having someone offer something to you like a free coffee is one thing, but prayer is another. This woman really believes in God. She actually believes that her mother will die and then go to an actual heaven. This baffles me, for my last words will not sound anything like peace-filled tasty wisdom tarts, but rather something along the lines of, “oh shit, what if the Jews were right!*” In the case of the woman in the drive through, she was so earnest and so sad about her mother there was no way I could reject her prayers. And because the other person who said he’d pray for me is such an important and respected figure in my life I couldn’t possibly say no. All I can do is shut up and receive.

So here I am, taking on these unknown wishes that people have for me. Letting them stack their intimate god speak in my annoyed and anxious arms like a mother loading up their college student to go back to school with pie, and ham, and tea, and frozen cheese.

I guess I’ll take whatever I can get.

*I’m quoting from somewhere.

Now when my boss got word of this she wanted me to write a little something about my interaction for corporate. The following is...The Corporation Version

It was a closing shift when she came through the drive through. She ordered a mocha, I took her money and asked how she was. It was at this point that her eyes turned into two tiny pools and her face to a muddy red earth color.

“Not well,” she whispered and thanked me for asking. At this, I let out a sort of cough/sigh and thanked her for answering honestly. She had just found out that her mother was in the hospices and would most likely die that night. She never fully cried in front of me but I knew that if I were to act on my initial impulse of leaping through the drive through onto her lap for an embrace, she’s probably just melt away (and I’d most likely receive a restraining order…or a pink slip).

She had already paid for her drink so I offered her a free drink card. She mentioned how she was going to give it to one of the two nurses taking care of her mother. With this, we agreed that the other nurse should probably get one too. Then I put another free drink card in her hand and told her to stop giving them away but rather treat and take care of herself.

We chatted a bit more and then she drove away. Our point of convergence had ended. She driving off, Strabucks goods in-tow, to see the woman who brought her into this world out of it; and me off to sanitize blender tops. That evening in the drive through may have been a lot of things. But everything that comes with personal agendas, sickening sensitivities, and fumbly humanness seems to be the very ‘stuff’ that bubbles under the foundation of The Starbucks Corporation. It is this breath of humanity that gives us the ability to turn corporate exchange into intimate connections.