Day Two

The total cost of my University degree was approximately $32,000. When I was 18, my first priority was to have as much fun as possible. I played for the varsity soccer team (we sucked) while I took dumbass "gym" classes with my friends (who I don't even see anymore). I had no career goals in mind; I saw only the bright lights of a future filled with possibilities, and I was convinced that my degree would catapult me straight into the pools of opportunity like a leggy 40-something walking into a seedy suburban pub.

All I got was a minimum wage job and a hangover.

I have to say though, that I believe that everyone should spend some time in the service industry because it helps us treat our fellow humanity with respect; if we know what it's like to work on the other side of the counter than we will be quicker to respond with grace and mercy. Not just when we get our coffees extra sweet when we asked for extra hot, but when we walk through our child's seemingly un-chewed Kraft Dinner vomit in the middle of the night, or when our nephew is born with a brain injury. Life-alteringly huge or embarrassingly small, we need the tools to deal with life when it (and the people in it) hand us adversity because we all know it's going to happen.

People teach me things all the time, and it almost always happens when I least expect it. I started my job at Starbucks in June and one summer night I worked with a girl named Trish. Quite honestly, I didn't like her straight off the get-go and in fact, I came home and told Andrew that I hated her. I thought she was bossy and rude and condescending. But the second time I worked with her I learned that she also went to the same University that I attended and she too, has a degree. I asked her over my nerdy drive-through headset how she felt about working at Starbucks when she has a degree, for goodnesssake, and she replied with, "I'm using my degree. I don't get paid much, but that's not what is important to me. I got my degree in "people" and this is where I belong."

I exhaled and humbly looked down at my vanilla syrup-splattered shoes and realized that Trish had it right all along.

A few months later she was outside in the drive-through changing garbages and I, at the drive through window, poked my head out and whistled at her. While I watched her, I noticed a lady drive through and, because Trish was in the middle of changing the trash bags, the woman impatiently threw her garbage at Trish. It bounced off her shoulder and fell to the ground.

What did Trish do? Get angry? Resent the amount of money she spent on her degree? No. She laughed. Because she knew that SHE had it going on, and that lady didn't have a fucking clue.

Life isn't about degrees, or education, or salaries. It's about people. Community. Kids throwing up macaroni, and nephews in wheelchairs and high school and Lego and letting mistakes go, giving and receiving grace. It's about not being alone. It's about togetherness.

And although now that I have a new job related to my degree, I'm not just walking away from minimum wage; I am walking away from some of the coolest people I've ever known. Because they know how to stand strong in who they are, strong enough to take the garbage in the face from a person who has far greater debt than they do. And that's a life lesson that I never want to forget.