Fish out of water

I’ve never really been the guy who makes friends easily and just gets a kick out of being around a lot of people. Which is probably surprising to many because let’s face it, nothing says, “Life of the party!” like Certified Public Accountant. Mostly, I just want people to leave me alone and stay out of my way. Don’t bother with the small talk, I’m not interested. In fact, should we ever meet just go ahead and avert your gaze so that we don’t have to share an awkward moment. Curiously, my wife is the exact opposite. We could walk together into a room of 25 strangers and, after spending an hour with them, have an entirely different experience to report. She would tell all about her 25 new friends, how she’s organizing a playdate for the other moms & their kids, how she’s invited several of them to our church’s family camp, how she’s going to have a scrapbook night at our house the following week, all the women are coming. I would report that I’d just lost an hour of my life that I’ll never get back and that I could live a full life never seeing any of those people again. Apparently, opposites do attract.

So it surprised me to no end when I instantly took a liking to Jason and his family. Jason now resides in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. A couple years ago he moved his family from South Dakota to SoCal to take a job as an associate pastor at my church. He stayed for about two years but moved back to South Dakota because he was offered a dream job. It probably didn’t hurt that his then-current position had turned into the job from hell. Their leaving was a bitter pill to swallow, I had become so attached to them. I sometimes drive by his old neighborhood and it still stings to know that he’s gone. But we keep in touch and whenever I get a call or an email from him I’m reminded of the great times we shared. I miss the guy for several reasons. He isn’t just a great friend, he’s a great leader, a great pastor. He’s passionate about pointing people to Christ in a very down to earth way. Just a regular guy with a “real” faith. The world would be a better place with more folks like him.

I laugh when I think about the small town boy in the big city. He was kind of like a mole that crawled from a dark cavern and wandered around in the bright sunlight. We were hanging out one afternoon and with wide eyes he told me, “Last night I could see a couple miles away and there was a police helicopter circling around for like ten minutes! It musta been something big going on!” He was a real fish out of water. Doing things that we take for granted every day seemed like a real adventure to him. One Saturday morning we had a class over at church just for the dads. Afterward a bunch of us went for some southern bbq near downtown Los Angeles. Since it was a Saturday and the traffic was lite, we made it in about 30 minutes or so. His wife later told me, “He said, ‘the food was good, but it took forever to get there!’” That’s right. It took 30 minutes to go from the west valley to downtown LA and this guy was complaining. Awesome. One of the benefits of living in the valley is its proximity to the beach. There were many days that we loaded our families into minivans and headed for Zuma. After a few trips Jason mentioned to me, “You see all those guys out there on boogie boards? Those things look cool, I’d really like to try that.” It had been well over 15 years but at one time I was a pretty avid boogie boarder. Forgetting that I was now 15+ years older and far from my old fighting weight I decided to pick one up for our next beach trip. Jason & his family rolled into the parking lot when I’d been riding waves for a good two hours. He hopped right into the water and started body surfing. I pushed the board over to him and told him to, “go for it.” I began giving a few instructions when a sizable wave presented itself and Jason decided that further instructions about the waves coming in 3’s & that he should try for the third wave weren’t really necessary. He began paddling furiously and found himself riding high on the crest of this very large wave. He bore a look of absolute euphoria. Right about that time Jason was introduced to what is commonly called a “shorebreak.”For the uninitiated, a shorebreak is a wave that crashes very close to the shore in very shallow water. This was the mother of all shorebreaks. The crest lurched forward and Jason was drilled into about 1 foot of water. His introduction to the shorebreak now complete, wave number 2 put in its appearance. Without even giving Jason a chance to stand up, this one slammed into him with all the force of a freight train. My buddy looked like a bath towel in a washing machine. I was actually becoming a bit concerned when his head finally popped up and he gasped for a much-needed breath. Right about that time wave number 3 added insult to injury and took him on another trip through the grinder. When the tidewaters receded Jason sat on his hands & knees, coughing & puking saltwater out of his lungs. And I’ll tell you, I didn’t even laugh. It was more of a chuckle. In between pukes he pushed the boogie board toward me. “Your turn.” We spent the rest of the afternoon burying our kids in the sand.

As much as I’d love for him to still be here, having a buddy from a small town and living in LA is a great reality check. It’s cool hearing about what’s happening in a small town and I love hearing that the LA experience is not universal. When he visits this summer we’re going to do some fishing & camping. I’m looking forward to it with all the excitement of a kid on Christmas eve. Maybe I can get him to come out early and we can go to the beach. Yeah, probably not.