The phone rang.
I offered my usual greeting, “Mayor McAdam’s office,” after which a beat transpired for a touch of additional gravity. I finished with, “May I help you please?”
“I have a story to tell.”
That sounds like an odd assertion to begin a conversation with someone in the mayor’s office. But our mayor is well described by his own campaign tag line... “Yeah, he’s different.”
Ben’s still new in office, but he’s been the source of thousands of letters. They congratulate Eagle Scouts, extend sympathy to the parents of children passed away, appreciate school crossing guards, tell a restaurant cook her meal was enjoyed, and so on, and so on.
I type them, but they originate with him, they express his sentiment, and they bear his signature.
So it’s probably no surprise, with thousands of letters in circulation tracing his short time in office, people now assume the mayor is interested in a story.
“Yes ma'am, what’s the story you have to share?" I asked.
The woman on the other end bubbled, “I’m Meredith Franck. I work in Criminal Justice Services teaching recovering addicts. I’ve got a story about our office and the people who work here.”
I connected Meredith instantly to a program assisting drug offenders identified as “corrigible.” They are put through an individualized course of coaching and support that hopefully leads to redemption. At the end, those who succeed attend a graduation in council chambers.
These are moving ceremonies. Family and friends couldn’t be happier if their loved one were getting a diploma from Harvard. Dads throw arms around sons, much like the father who some years ago said, “This son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.”
Meredith continued, “I help people trying to get straight. Some come to my office once a week, some once a day, some for a few minutes, some for an hour. Our program is no longer new, and by now I guess the results speak for themselves.”
“Yes, they do,” I answered.
“But a few years ago, when the bottom of the economy fell out, things seemed to change somehow.”
“Really?”
“Yes, the people I served were more distracted. The typical client wasn’t as motivated or able to give their full attention or priority to the program. All our people are different, of course, but I could sense a change, and it concerned me. I struggled with my impression before it finally occurred to me, ‘They’re hungry!’ They’re living life on the margin in a bad economy. Probably unemployed and almost unemployable, many are alone with most of their bridges burned.”
Meredith’s dawning realization was easy to understand. The program had a sustained record of success and then suddenly the economy fell off a cliff one Tuesday at 2:12 PM. You’d have to be paying very close attention to sense the first intimation of behavioral change.
“So, what’d you do?”
“Did it make a difference?” I asked.
“Yes, it did. But the need was greater than expected. One basket became two, and then shelves were added. Tom and Leslie were quite generous, but still, in the beginning the baskets would frequently run out.”
“How’d you fix that?”
Meredith paused for a moment, “That’s the crazy part,” she said, “I really didn’t do anything.”
“Nothing?”
“No, I had a lot going on, but the situation just seemed to fix itself. I sort of assumed we’d found an equilibrium between need and what we had to offer. But one day not long ago, for reasons hard to explain, I took an accounting of what was in those baskets.”
“And...?”
“I was the one who picked up the bread from Great Harvest. And I was the one who checked in food donations from Leslie. I knew what we were receiving, and I knew how much. Yet, when I looked in those baskets, much of the food I saw didn’t come from the Food Bank, and it didn’t come from Great Harvest.”
“Where did it come from, Meredith?”
She laughed, “Darned if I could figure. So I decided to watch those baskets carefully and see if I could identify the secret benefactor. And eventually I did...”
“So who was it?”
“Everyone,” she replied. “virtually everyone in the office was rummaging through their pantry and bringing in anonymous donations. They would stop by those baskets, quite surreptitiously, and drop in their donation. They wouldn’t take credit, they tried not even to be noticed.”
“That is a beautiful story,” I said.
“Yes, I thought so,” she replied, “do you think the mayor might like to hear it?”
“I’m certain he would.”
And so, a few hours later Ben sat at my desk listening to just that story. An hour after that four letters were in his outbox... one to each important actor in the delightful story that Meredith had to tell.
Letters which were very easy to type.
