I spend many of my waking hours avoiding moments of truth.
Which is pretty understandable. I mean, I’m a father, husband and my business supports my family. Which means like my wife I’m overworked, underpaid and perpetually tired.
So I live in a constant state of flux. Work deadlines blend in to family deadlines that merge with stress and ricochet off of all the caffeine in my system.
So who can blame me for missing a few seconds here and there of moment-to-moment life?
Funny thing is, my daughter and I were at a local java-hut the other day and I witnessed someone not avoid the truth.
Next to our table there was a father who in one arm carried his screaming two year old to the cashier while his five-year-old girl sat next to us with her hot chocolate.
That she immediately lost control of and splashed all over the floor. It was pretty spectacular, actually. Paper cup kind of flew out of her hands, arched over the corner of our table and formed this instantly endless milk-chocolate reservoir that just kept spreading.
Her dad came back and picked up the cup, as his son continued screaming. A moment later the manager, a middle-aged Indian man came over and started mopping up the choco-lake.
Dad looked over and offered his apologies but this manager was totally cool~he just said “No, no please these things happen”.
Which was just such a refreshing and often unseen reaction to this kind of thing. Then the manager goes “Sir, what did she have?”.
Dad was kind of surprised and goes “Oh uh, hot chocolate…”.
And a minute later, this manager returns with a new drink for the little girl.
Then he cleans off their table. Then, he actually grabs a new paper napkin and dries off the table so they don’t have to rest their elbows in that thin film of water.
Okay, so now I’m impressed.
Or maybe I’m restored to what people are capable of when they don’t avoid the obvious.
So dad gathers up his newly chocolated daughter, his screaming boy, smiles to us and jets.
And I tell my girl, “Ella did you see what that man did?”.
Then I explain how the man brought the little girl a new hot chocolate and Ella asks “Why did he bring it?”.
And honestly, part of my is asking the same thing. Which happens if you live in New York and you forget to exhale every once in a while.
Instead of seeing moments as possibilities you see them as annoyances.
But that part of me that is still capable of exhaling explains to Ella that sometimes people are capable of caring for others. And sometimes you can just give someone a new hot chocolate if they spill theirs.
At the mention of free hot chocolate, Ella seemed to really get interested. So as we’re leaving I pick her up and detour by the cashier. The manager has his back to us and I ask “Excuse me...are you the manager?”.
He turns, sees us and walks over, a little flash of concern painting his face.
“Yes, sir may help you”.
“Well, I just thought that was a really gracious gesture on your part. I’m a father and I know what its like to always feel like you’re overwhelmed and making a mess everywhere you go…”.
And suddenly and pretty effortlessly, this kindly Indian man just starts beaming light.
I mean like, Della Reese “Touched By An Angel” light.
And I’m holding Ella and he’s beaming us and we’re all lit up like big shiny human-stars and he gestures with his hand and says
“This store is my baby. I am the owner and my customers are family to me. I am blessed to have this place. God-blessed so thank you for such nice words”.
And it felt like Ella and I were looking down the barrel of this long, golden tunnel of light and she felt feather-light and my voice sounded like barely an echo of itself and I managed to say something like “Well god-bless you for your kindness…”.
And then like instantly, the tunnel-beam closed and we were just in this tiny coffee shop on the upper west side and I was walking away with Ella and she goes “What happened?”.
And I didn’t really have an answer. I wasn't sure what happend. As I was putting her in the stroller random thoughts just crisscrossed my mind, like what if that guy beamed us so brightly we had half-face tans like Richard Dreyfus in Close Encounters Of The Third Kind?
And would Ella sometimes not answer her cell when her dad was calling just hoping to hear his little girl's voice?
And why does six ounces of hot chocolate in a cup somehow triple in volume to 18 ounces when it spills on to a horizontal surface?
I snugged Ella's coat around her, realizing you can’t keep little girls from growing up. And maybe that's a good thing. Maybe that's how we can rescue the truth from obscurity. By just exhaling and realizing that we can't package moments so they aren't messy, or painful.
We can just try and be present for as many truthful-moments as we can stand, even when its right in front of us, on the floor covered in hot-chocolate.
