For Wilshire Baptist Church
It was LeAnn’s idea and a good one: sit at our turquoise table at 2:45 p.m. and offer cold bottled water and bags of chips and crackers to the high school kids that stream down our street when school lets out. We wouldn’t put up a sign; we’d just be out there and try to get their attention, which is no small feat with kids who are awkward and hesitant and are prone to tune out the world with headphones.
“So what will we say?” LeAnn asked, which I found unusual because she has the gift of hospitality like nobody I’ve ever known.
“I don’t know,” I answered, and I truly didn’t know. Hospitality is not my gift; hesitance and hiding are more my speed. But I do have the gift of trusting and going along with one of LeAnn’s plans.
And so we waited, with LeAnn sitting at the table the way it was meant to be sat, and me sitting on the top of the table with my feet on the seat in what I called “the cool dude position” although I wasn’t feeling cool at all. But then the first lone kid came along and that set the pattern for our encounters. LeAnn said, “Hi, would you like some snacks and water for your walk home?” And I dipped into the ice chest and held up a bottle of water as if to say, “Yes, we really do have bottled water and this is what it looks like.”
The results were mixed. The first lone kid did exactly what I might have done: she jaywalked away from us and shook her head “no.” Others soon followed. A few walked up boldly but most had to be coaxed a little. Out of a group of four, two came and two waited at the corner. A kid with a lollipop stick in his mouth took some hard candy. Some thanked us, and some said the same with a silent nod of the head.
When the kids quit coming, we counted and found we’d handed out just nine bottles of water and fewer bags of chips. As we carried our goods back inside, LeAnn said some day years from now one of those kids may remember a hot day on the first week of school when a strange couple sitting at a turquoise table was handing out snacks.
“Yes, we were modeling awkward hospitality,” I said. And I was learning a few things in the process:
– LeAnn’s voice can penetrate headphones.
– Kids today are as hesitant and shy as I was at that age.
– Apparently it’s cool to wear a hoodie when it’s 98 degrees outside.
– Awkward goes both ways and knows no age. I’m no more comfortable making the first move than I was when I was 16.
The high school effort was in some ways a practice for Garland’s Labor Day Parade, which began at the park a couple of blocks away from our house. LeAnn marched in the parade with her high school band and remembers how exhausting it was, so we set up in time to catch parade participants as they walked back to their cars.
We had more takers this time: band members who were hungry and thirsty, three drill teamers who were parched and wanted to pose for pictures, an ROTC cadet who took some water while chatting on the phone, families who had come to watch the parade and appreciated an energy boost until lunchtime. We tried but failed to stop a trailer load of candy-colored clowns, but we did coax a visit from a band member wearing a Sousaphone almost as big as himself. He started to bend over to get a water bottle but asked for help when he realized his center of gravity was too high.
None of these people – the high schoolers or paraders – were our neighbors in the literal sense, as in living next door or down the street. They were all walking toward their own neighborhoods or to their cars to return to their neighborhoods and their families. But they were neighbors in the broader sense that they inhabit our community and our world.
We’ll try the after-school handouts again sometime, and maybe we’ll feel less awkward and more comfortable and confident, or maybe we won’t. But that’s okay because there’s plenty of room in community for awkward. In a way that’s sort of what makes a community interesting.