This evening I decided to spend some of my half-a-weekend in a different way. No dining alone at my favorite Sicilian restaurant. No delivery pizza in front of the TV. I took a little drive across town to visit Gary.
Gary is a former manager I worked for at Meineke. He spent 30 plus years in the exhaust business. Gary can rack up a vehicle, run to the bender and bend a pair of tailpipes for a dual-out and hand them to you and they will fit. Perfectly. He's one of my teachers and my main mentor. He's an artist and perfectionist and I learned perfectionism from Gary. He prides himself not on his skills at the pipe bender but at the customer service counter and that is the skill he tried the hardest to instill in me.
So this evening I dropped by his apartment. That was a little after 7pm and here it is after 2 am that I've just got home to tell you about it. We spent some time talking about business, my shop, our old shop, local gossip, etc. He spent a major part of the time lecturing me about all the things he had tried so hard to teach me about salesmanship. About reaching your customers and their wallets and making them come back to you not your shop. Lectures I'd heard a million times before, but will now not tire of.
We went out to dinner and the lectures continued. Then back at his place the conversation turned to other matters. Our love lifes, mine in particular, about the woman who played the femme fatale in my firing from Meineke and I told him the whole sordid story he hadn't heard yet. We both relished in some of the details that don't need to be retold here.
Then for some reason the conversation turned to my JW upbringing and Christianity in general. By this time we had both put down quite a few Heineken's so I'm sure that flavored the debate. Gary told me how much he loved the book of Job. Somewhat automatically I took an argumentative stance not just on the book of Job but on the whole Bible as we know it. Gary kept telling me that Job said (this is the best I can quote) that if someone sues you for one cow (or some livestock, not sure) to give them two. Anyway his point was to go the extra mile even when you are being wronged, turn the other cheek and all. I argued that Job didn't say that but it was Jesus and I mentioned Matthew 5:40 to back it up.
The debate became more intense with Gary defending the King James Version of the Bible and calling for faith while I questioned the accuracy of said version (or any version for that matter) and even the whole basis of organized Christianity. Gary couldn't find his KJ and I only have a copy of the NWT which wasn't with me at the time. Plus we'd both contributed quite a bit of capital towards the growth of the Heineken stock which you'll see come Monday morning in the financial papers. So the debate concluded with Gary assuring me that he believed sincerely what he was saying and me assuring him I'd read the Bible more times than he had.
With this past week marking my ten year anniversary of disfellowshipment (did I mention that? I'll make another post regarding that tomorrow) tonight has been a very ironic night. Tonight started as a very simple evening: visit an old friend and drink to old times. Instead it turned into a bizarro field service visit with me on the householder's side and someone else witnessing to me about faith. That was his final argument, having faith.
I'll revisit this post tomorrow when I've had some sleep because right now I am so tired both mentally and physically that I can barely type what I have so far so stay tuned.
It was good to see my old friend and mentor again and to see that he is doing well though.
Mike.