Two events (and a billion more, I’m sure) events were
critical to my ending up behind the wheel of a garbage truck. The first was a
conversation I had with a friend who teaches at the U of MN. I asked for any
advice she had as I was coming to the end of writing my dissertation. She said
very matter-of-factly, “Get a job. Any job. Bag groceries.” The difficulty
people experience in the transition from a period of intense work and focus to no
one thing in particular is a big deal. New retirees experience it all the time.
My friend had seen friends become unraveled once the book was written and there
was nothing more to do with it. I knew she was right and I needed something to
do once there was nothing more to do with what had consumed me for two years.
The other event was that I had a dream. I knew when I awoke
that it was somehow a big dream. In it, I was driving down a treacherous
mountain road in my ’93 Toyota Corolla. Suddenly before me there opened a
yawning crevasse that I could not stop in time to avoid. Somehow, I got out of
the car before it plummeted over the edge and found myself hanging onto the car
with one hand to keep if from crashing to the bottom. An impossible situation
to be sure. I had to let go (or die), but I couldn’t.
Suddenly the scene changed. A white garbage truck appeared
and slowly rumbled past me down the same stretch of snowy mountain road, only
now it was smooth and wide and well plowed. The truck easily rolled down the
road that had been impossible for me before.
A couple days later (not dreaming) I was working at
replacing the porch on our house. I looked up and a white garbage truck rolled
to a stop in front of the house. We had just switched our garbage service to a
new local hauler. Wes pulled up in his white truck that day, grabbed our can,
and came over to introduce himself. With the dream on my mind and my friend’s
words still ringing, I asked if he might need some help. He did not at the
moment. But two weeks later I got a call late at night from a very weary
sounding Wes. He asked if I was serious about driving… I didn’t even ask what
it paid. I started the next day.
Wes started his small garbage business at the age of 40,
after a career in sales. A garbage truck was not his dream, but being a small business owner
and entrepreneur was. Since I first met him, he responds to “How ya doin?” with
an enthusiastic “Livin the dream!”
I guess I am too, though in a different way. Makes me thoughtful about the way dreams got Joseph (the biblical patriarch) into trouble, but also got him through trouble.
Dignity in work, Rev. Dr. Thanks also for the very positive punch line - that this is a dream for ur small biz owner friend...and as as friend who did something similar once said to me (he left software development to own a snow removal biz), "It can't be outsourced to India" :).
ReplyDeleteKeep 'em coming.
Dave
Hi Rev, in Sweden they might call what you're doing "Wallraffing" ("wallraffa")--yes it is a verb. But this is generally done with purely journalistic intent. Yours is quite different. Holy shit, would be an appropriate response, eh? Thank you John, I love your reflections and really look forward to the next. Alex T.
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