Cafeteria Courage

When I was eight, perhaps nine years old in Elementary School, I begged my parents for lunch money. I had been making my own lunch for two years then, and it always left me dissatisfied, and more importantly, made me look poor. I bought my lunches from then on, 4th grade then—it was 4th grade.

There was this man, he seemed not at all old. Looking back now, I would guess he was in his 30s. He had blonde hair, parted to the side, blue eyes. Pink undertones in his skin. His demeanor was shy and he never made eye contact.

He served lunch in our Elementary School cafeteria. By 4th grade I had somehow worked myself into the “popular” crowd. I was best friends with the two coolest girls in 4th grade, and we all bought lunch together.

Every lunch, he served more than a hundred thoughtless and ungrateful children with shaking, trembling hands. His hands and arms vibrated as he looked down, focusing on his work. Sometimes he tremored so much, it sometimes seemed he wouldn’t make it from ladle to tray. But he always did.

Every lunch, I heard my friends and other children mock him. And I didn’t ever think about any of this in words then.

Every lunch, I made sure I met his eyes with a smile and a small, but cheerful “thank you.” I didn’t know why it bothered me so much--just that he tried very hard, didn’t seem like he should be there, seemed to know and be aware of how others perceived his tremors, and continued on regardless of it all. I couldn’t put that into words to myself at that time; I didn’t have the self or world experience. All I knew was that it bothered me.

It sounds grandiose and others have accused me of that, but I do feel like I felt all those things before I could understand and know them; and most basically--empathy. I felt sheer empathy without knowing that’s what it was. It hurt me every time, to see him shaking so hard, silently enduring, hearing children’s mocking as he served our food with a quiet commitment.

I’m 30 years old, and I still think about this man.

After watching my grandmother suffer with Parkinson’s, I am almost sure now he was suffering from early onset Parkinson’s and that in this horrible f*****g country, that was the only job he could get.

I never heard him utter a word.

I struggle with hate for the country that condemned him to that job with little pay and a great deal of mockery; when he may have been capable of so much more—tremor or no.

I wonder what happened to him, because I feel the shy smiles and thank you’s of a nine-year-old every day are too little, too small.

How many disabled of us are in the system, like rusty cogs, our tremors and limps laughed at by the children we serve?

Then, my friends laughed “Why is he shaking so weird?!”

Now, teaching, as I walked, aching and limping out of the school after a long day—a teenage boy with a girl at his side laughed at me, “Why is she walking so weird?!”

I wish I could know and ask him: where are you now? Are you okay?

I heard them speak. We heard their mockery.

I would like to ask you earnestly—we tremored; did anyone ever recognize your strength?

2021

Image Courtesy of: Photo 168994747 © Chernetskaya | Dreamstime.com