A day that changed everything.
A day that changed everything.
Dear Gina: Your post is close to something I have been thinking about,which I hope is a proper extension of your original theme. I have been working on a series of what I would call dramatic life moments. In addition to being dramatic, these are moments that, in some important way, exerted a permanent effect. The first of these moments was about 54 years ago, when I was six years old.
My father had decided to be the first in his family to go to college, and had moved his wife and two sons to Minneapolis. His previous work as a wheat farmer had supplied a small nest egg, but this was disappearing with surprising and alarming speed. I was with him in the car, and we were going to an employment interview, where my Dad hoped to be hired as the caretaker of a large apartment building in Minneapolis.
This was a different, more innocent time, and he told me to wait in the car while he went in. For a six year old, this whole thing was seeming to take forever. My Dad was not the kind of man to disobey. But I was curious, bored and hot. I had watched the door he went through and started to obsess about what was going on in that forbidden space. The only danger that mattered to me at that point was the risk of getting caught by my Dad if I left the car. The time continued to crawl. I would quietly open the car door, and the quickly close it. Finally, I had left the car door a few feet behind, and my hand was on the door I had seen my father pass through.
A child can be so quiet when they really want to be absolutely silent. I was in a hallway, and could hear the conversation behind a closed door. My uncle had always said I was born with a big vocabulary. I think that was true, and I was immediately tracking, from my hidden place, the forbidden talk. The man said he liked farmers because they knew how to work, and could fix anything. I knew this was good. He told my Dad he had the job, and I knew that was great. Our little family had prayed for this exact thing just a few hours earlier. A caretaker’s job meant our housing would be provided.
I should have scooted back to the car. There was a huge risk of getting caught. But there was something in the man’s voice-even a child could tell there was a catch. Nobody was getting up, and I wasn’t going anywhere yet. As a six year old I couldn’t understand why he would say this- but I heard him tell my Dad that, for apartment 17, he would collect a certain amount, but enter a lesser amount on the receipts book. He was asking my Dad to agree to lie.
The circumstances of life had come together in a very difficult way for my Dad. If he didn’t lie, would there be another chance to obtain the housing we needed? We were running out of money, and experiencing the vulnerability of the poor. But the risk was worse for my Dad than he could know. This compromise, if agreed to, would be done right in front of me, even though they couldn’t knw that.
So much depended on the next few words. My Dad said "you are asking me to lie. I cannot lie for you". My Dad wouldn’t lie-but the job he needed and could have had-was falling off the table in front of us. The man told my Dad that Minneapolis was full of men that where willing to tell a little lie in order to get the job. I was frozen against the wall, and then heard my Dad say something I will never forget. Here is what he told that man:
“You should remember one thing. When you find the man who will lie for you, you have found a man who will lie to you”.
I heard that and I was out of there. Quiet as a mouse, and just as quick. Back to the car in plenty of time. One minute led into another. Where was he? It seemed like forever. Then he finally came out that door, and into the car. All innocence, I asked him what happened? He answered: “I got the job”. That was all he said. I said that’s great. And that’s all I dared to say. The silence of the guilty. But it was a day that changed everything.
