I was the (un)fortunate recipient of a task important to a new magazine the Florida Catholic is producing for the Diocese of St. Petersburg. Involvement in the task has required me to gain not just a boat-load, but a cruise-ship load of patience, humility, and perseverance.
If you know me, or are into guessing what the task may be, your list might possibly include promoting the magazine — organizing and writing stories — maybe capturing the right moment in photos — or maybe, just maybe, laying out the magazine and sending it off to print. NOPE! Instead, Mr. Christopher James Gunty, associate publisher and editor of the Florida Catholic was (un)kind enough to offer me a learning opportunity that would allow me to go from almost postal, to garnering the patience, humility, perseverance and gratitude, encouraged during Advent. Who could have ever guessed in dealing with the United States Postal Service (USPS) one would embrace the atmosphere of Advent? Certainly, not me.
The best visual I can give you of what this process has been like is to refer back to Alice’s Restaurant, a movie/song of a real life tale experienced by Arlo Guthrie, son of Woody Guthrie (This Land is Your Land). Arlo weaves a tale of Thanksgiving dinner and what to do with the left over trash. In the end, they go to the dump and dispose of it. While they did the right thing by not littering in the town of Stockbridge, Massachusetts, it’s illegal to climb the fence and dispose of trash when the dump is closed. One thing leads to another and Arlo gets arrested after they find an envelope with his name on it among the mix of trash and turkey bones.
The story proceeds from the outcome of the arrest to Arlo being drafted into the Army. During indoctrination, he is placed in “Group W” because of his arrest. The Army inspector dealing with the criminal types let’s loose at one point and rattles off a sentence so quickly, it sounds like one word. And it goes something like this — “Kids, this-piece-of-paper’s-got-47-words-37-sentences-58-words-we-wanna-know-details-of-the-crime-time-of-the-crime-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say-pertaining-to-and-about-the-crime-I-want-to-know-arresting-officer's-name-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say.”
My adventure with the USPS over the past three weeks mirrors Arlo’s experience during his Army indoctrination. At least in the beginning when I was presented a Santa’s list of official form numbers. Yes-ma’am-we-can-help-you-just-fill-out-this-form-and-that-form-and-revise-3500-plus-add-the-PAF-and-don’t-forget-to-include-this-one-and-that-one-and-add-another-for-additional-entry-what’s-your-USPS-number-and-where’s-your-ISSN-number-give-me-your-ACS-info-and-don't-ask-me-it’s-up-to-you-to-figure-out-no-I-don’t-have-a-chair-so-stand-for-two-plus-hours-and-have-a-good-day.
And as our God will have it, just about the time I was ready to go, um, POSTAL — out of the blue, or maybe the purple of Advent, Terrie Lawson walked into my life. In the midst of the dark world of government forms — Terrie became my USPS angel on this earth. From 9 a.m. until after 2 p.m. last Thursday, Terrie translated the “postal-bonics” language for me. With a soothing voice she guided me through the maze of mystery that has been fine-tuned in the world of USPS forms. More than once, I feared she would say, “That’s all the time I can spend with you.” But never did those words leave her mouth. And lunch? What about lunch? I dared not ask if she were hungry, for again I feared my time would be up. At 2 p.m. as I went to pay $590 in fees, I turned to Terrie and begged her to let me at least take her to lunch. She informed me it would have to be another time. On Friday she was taking a vacation day to see her grand daughter perform in a talent show so she would have to put her “pedal to the metal” the rest of Thursday to get all her work done.
Never once during the five hours we were together, did Terrie indicate she was on deadline to get all in order for Friday. She never made me feel rushed, ignorant, uncomfortable or defeated. Not once did Terrie indicate she was too busy, or too important, or too stressed, or too valuable to help me with every, little detail. Every second was truly a joy. I am grateful for this USPS angel who taught me more about how to journey during Advent, in the five hours I was with her than I have learned in a long time.
I offered prayers of thanksgiving for Terrie on my drive back to Orlando, asking the Holy Spirit to help her stay focused and allow all duties to fall in place without glitches, so she would leave work before dark. I’m sure her grand daughter’s performance of the Beach Boys hit, “Surfin’ USA” remains a scrapbook memory. And an added piece to this story — I now pray daily for the repose of the soul of Terrie’s son, who died at age 31, leaving behind his little performer for grandma to love, hug, cheer on at every performance or game, and help her through the struggles of life or to learn about the Advent journey. How blessed we are to have Terrie on this earth. Thank you Terrie!
Thank you God!
