Soup Kitchens, Bowls, and Hands that Hold
A hardware store employee mistook me for a soup kitchen last weekend. This man made a clumsy attempt to hit on me, and regardless of player, I hate that game. He clearly didn’t listen to a word I said in the store, or when he followed me to my car under the guise of helping me - “help” I had politely declined four times and only made lifting a heavy piece of equipment twice as awkward and dangerous. He made a presumptuous statement that implied my consent to conversing with him, but he didn’t want to share conversation. He wanted conversation from me.
It was clear that I had nothing to do with his pursuit, and it was obvious he had no idea what he was actually pursuing. He wanted what I have. I was glowing. Felt like shit physically but couldn’t help but smile. Touching tools, any tools, makes my mercury rise. I was laughing, joking, my voice was strong and steady. In that moment, old timers would say “son, you couldn’t tell her a thing!” I’ve never refinished wooden floors, and my mother, brother and I were tackling it together; subsidizing our limited time and budget with elbow grease and optimism (yay, we killed did it!). I was on cloud nine, and it couldn’t be fully contained.
The absence of my abuser’s chaos has made an abundance of space for my peace, joy, and passion, and surviving attempted murder injects an added measure of gratitude into each waking moment. I had long known what I loved, and on that gorgeous day I was gnawing my own bone.
And I could see the desperation, the undeniably hungry look in that man’s eyes long before he opened his mouth and removed all doubt.
He saw what I had, and he thought I could feed him.
There is one thing I know to be true in every lifetime, at every age, for every single soul - the only person who can feed you is you.
It’s the opposite concept of the Wayside School Ice Cream story. If he tried to gnaw my bone, it would taste like nothing. Satisfy nothing. And I pity anyone who can’t grasp that each of us contain all of the ingredients required for a feast that never spoils, or that the ingredients are as unique as our DNA, or that they are the only person who can prepare this meal.
Eventually he landed in my inbox with his second presumptuous and problematic statement, so I took the opportunity to educate this man about the difference in being “nice”, a vacuous pseudo-virtue and word he had chosen to describe me, and being “kind”, a much more corporeal characteristic that I strive to maintain. I made it clear that he had brought his appetite to the wrong person. I am not a soup kitchen, sir. Now if you’ll please excuse me, I am in the middle of my meal. “Bone” appétit!
When I returned the equipment the next day, he was working, and I greeted him brightly - after all, it was a beautiful morning, I had easily lifted the tool out of my car, and my eyes were open and my body above ground. I was blissfully sober on life, a state that no intoxication can mimic or match. He treated me as a vaguely familiar acquaintance, and asked me to confirm my first name. Perhaps he hadn’t even caught that the day before, trapped by his gnawing hunger. Oliver Twist and his empty bowl…
A couple days later I was driving and made a quick stop at a Turnpike travel plaza. Standing in line to place an order, I noticed the front was off of a refrigerated case, and a Veto backpack sat beside a small pile of tools - property of an apparent Milwaukee devotee. The Milwaukee kneepads and hi-viz shirt on the gentleman in front of me caught my eye, and I brightly inquired “How do you like that backpack Veto?” I had just taken a selfie in my car, and was amused that my own Veto bag and a package of baby wipes had photobombed. I thought “I wear a lot of hats…what a blessing.”
The man was slightly confused at first, and then realized I wasn’t speaking a strange language. It was the tongue of his trade, just an unexpected mouth. He brightened back, and enthusiastically gave an honest review - the bag was great, but as he frequently worked on the travel plaza rooftops, he found that clearing the roof hatch could be challenging with the extra backside bulk. Our interaction was brief, and although we were both purchasing a meal, neither of us were hollowed out by hunger. We were breaking our individual bread together; toasting a trade that is fascinating, challenging, and provides endless justification for one more bag and one more tool.
We didn’t exchange names, but I’m sure I’d know him and he would know me if we crossed paths again. When neither pair of hands is gripping a bowl, what is remembered is the person for whom the hands hold.
My friends, that’s the goal.
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Do what you love. Know your own bone; gnaw at it, bury it, unearth it and gnaw it still.
-Henry David Thoreau.