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Pecan Man
I spent the early months of my AmeriCorps*NCCC service "getting things done" for the Charleston County Human Services Commission. Every day for six weeks, four of us piled into a rickety minivan and traveled to the most rural parts of Jasper County to weatherize homes for low-income families. Wearing paint suits and dust masks, we crawled into stuffy attics and filled them with rolls of insulation.
I remember that time as being the most positive and fulfilling of my life. I embodied everything that AmeriCorps stood for. I served selflessly, opened myself freely to others, jumped into leadership roles, and stepped out of my comfort zone every day.
All that changed the day my mother died. Although she had been battling cancer, my mother had urged me to join AmeriCorps, assuring me that we still had plenty of time together. We were wrong about that, and her death filled me with pain and guilt.
A week after the funeral, I returned to Jasper County, the excitement of my service having been replaced by bitterness and regret. In the attics of South Carolina, I chose to face my pain alone. Disengaged from others, I mindlessly caulked windows and installed insulation to keep complete strangers warm in the cold winter months. But I found that I was the one who was cold.
One gray morning we piled into the van for yet another day of weatherization. We pulled onto a dirt road on the outskirts of a nondescript town, to a rusty and beaten trailer. Our site supervisors told us to gather up our tools and grab some new heating vents from the van. When we entered the trailer, an old man greeted us at the door. Old is an understatement. This man was ancient. Clad in faded overalls and a flannel shirt, he had that weathered look about him, as if each wrinkle told a story of hardship. I glanced at his arthritic knuckles as he opened the door for us, and then looked into his face. He nodded a silent hello.
We set out to complete our assigned task of replacing his older heating vents with new ones. While we were working, I noticed buckets and buckets overflowing with brown nuts. I looked around the trailer, and in every corner there were more of these same buckets.
Curiosity got the better of me and I asked one of the supervisors what the buckets were filled with. "Pecans," he replied. He grabbed two of them, crunched them together in his large fist, and showed me the meaty insides of the nuts. "Try 'em," he said, as I nervously put one into my mouth. He laughed at my scrunched-up face as the bitterness of the nut hit my tongue.
Within an hour we had installed all of the new vents and started to clean up. While we were working, the old man had just sat on his couch and observed us silently. As we filed into the doorway to leave, he caught my eyes once more and slowly pointed to the chair next to me. I looked down to find four bags, neatly knotted, each filled with pecans. I picked the bags up, thanked the man, and walked out of the trailer.
In the van, as my teammates excitedly opened the bags and began to eat the pecans, the power of the old man's simple gesture hit me. He had nothing but pecans gathered with his own hands from the trees of South Carolina, but he was still able to give. I realized just how selfish I had been. Yes, I had been dealt a terrible blow with the death of my mom, but I was still alive. I still had everything I needed to survive. I could still give.
I learned this lesson in rural South Carolina in a dilapidated trailer that I will never see again, but I often think of that man and the wisdom he taught me that day. I carry one of his pecans in my purse so that I will never forget his message. Without AmeriCorps*NCCC, I would never have turned my mother's death into an experience that taught me the ultimate lesson in life: To give is to live. |
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