$3.18

(For Hayden. Thank you!)





$3.18
That's how much it costs me
to buy breakfast, lunch or dinner
at In-N-Out.
I have my order memorized too
(always delivered with a smile),
"Can I get a cheeseburger--
with no onions and no tomatoes!--
and french fries, and a water,
please?"
It's about this time that I usually
begin to rummage about in my spacious
purse only to find that, though my
bag contains every other item I could
possible want or imagine, my wallet must still
be residing in one of the five other
purses scattered about my room,
or perhaps it's tucked snugly
away in my fat brown backpack that's
stuffed with novels, anthologies,
and volumes of poetry.
Either way, it's not with me,
and so I sadly start to cancel my order
while simultaneously begging my companions
for a mere $3.18 to cover a meal
for a starving college student.
I am blessed to have generous friends who
don't seem to mind rescuing me from
my forgetfulness (and hunger),
and so I walk away from the whole
experience feeling an enormous sense
of relief over the disaster
I have just managed to avert.
The food always comes in efficient,
but still aesthetically pleasing,
little red trays which I ponder while I
am filling up my four--sometimes five--
paper containers of ketchup, and grabbing
wads of napkins for the inevitable mess
that is about to occurr.
Melissa thinks that these trays
are an affirmation of our personal value.
"You're worth a tray," they say happily,
as I realize I could've received
my food in a plain white paper bag.
I really appreciate people who
pick up on details like this...
or the fact that all the West Coast
kids pronounce "In-N-Out" with an
emphasis on the "In" and with a slurring
of the first two syllables, while all
the non-West-Coast-kids pronounce
"In-N-Out" slowly, articulating each
word and emphasizing the "Out."
This only serves to remind me that
I lived the first eighteen years of my
life without ever knowing that a restaurant
chain called "In-N-Out" even existed.
Stuff like this depresses me because
I always wonder what else I am completely
ignorant of that I would end up falling
delightedly in love with should I only
have the privilege of being introduced to it?
You know what else depresses me?
The fact that there are just some things
I will never experience.
For instance:
I will never spend my childhood
summers on a houseboat at Lake Powell.
That's not to say that my childhood
summers weren't filled with all sorts
of exciting adventures ranging up
and down the East Coast, but still--
for every one thing I experience
there are a million and one things
that I will never get the opporunity
to see, to feel, to taste, to smell, to hear!
Peter understands.
He's frustrated over the knowledge
that even if he reads a book a day
for the rest of his life, he'll never
be able to read all the books in the world.
Chris has a different take on it:
"Don't you find it incredibly exciting
that no matter how much you read you'll
never run out of books?!"
That's the beauty of it.
"It's kind of like God!" I chime in.
(Bear with me--I like analogies.)
"Leave it to an English major to say that,"
Andrew mutters with not a small amount of
tolerance for my book-loving soul.
"No, really!" I insist.
"We know we can never fully comprehend God,
but that doesn't lessen the joy
that we find in constantly coming to know
Him more and more. Would you want to serve
a god who could be completely understood
after a certain amount of hard work
and study? Would you want to live in a world
that didn't overwhelm you?

Here we are. All that for only $3.18!
Three hundred and eighteen tiny steps toward God.
Three hundred and eighteen rungs on the ladder
to Heaven that stands in the middle of the
bustling In-N-Out positioned strategically
just off the freeway on Valley View Drive.