Endangered species: Men who snap their fingers.

I saw something rather unusual today.  Actually, it was no less than ten minutes ago.

I was walking, taking a short cut to my very dull office, via the library; it’s close to my office on campus.  And also, I have several several friends who work in the library, so I was anticipating speaking to one or two of them, namely Amanda, who is my best friend.

And so that’s what I did, and I spoke to her for a few minutes, begged her to bring me some lunch (on Mondays and Fridays I get no lunch hour), and after I’d said my piece, which I can’t even remember at the moment because I’d had no breakfast and thus wasn’t able to concentrate entirely on conversations, I took off for the downstairs door on the first floor, and coming straight at me, in a John Deere cap, a tad askew, and somewhat weathered camouflage coveralls, was a clean shaven young man, about 6’2″, bone thin, with a large bookbag (both shoulder straps on)…snapping.

He was snapping.

 

Not to earphoned music, nor to a whistle of his own, just snapping, and not even a “hand jive” kinda snap, where both hands work together to create the “beat,” he was randomly snapping, each hand, each set of fingers, completely independent of the other…and he was smiling.

 

 I’m not so sure he didn’t have pep in his step.

And my first thought, of course, because I’m mean most of the time, was “What is this guy’s problemo?” (and, as you might expect, this would be accompanied by a look of derision, followed by a lagniappe of smirk)…but just as I was about to serve him some social scorn, I stopped.

Our eyes caught for a second, and then, before I could help myself, I smiled at him. I smiled at him and gave him a tiny, ever-so-slight nod of the head, that ever-so-slight nod that quite frankly is the same as saying, “Yes, young man, you’ve done well and deserve to snap and this nod is my way of saying I approve.  And you can’t stop snapping now because I’ve seen you and I know that you are snapping for all of us.” 

And then, I thought, “What am I doing?” but then, you know what… maybe that was the right thing to do because maybe he doesn’t have a problemo, not anymore…maybe he’s already found a solution, or an answer, or that most prized of all places for those weighed down by problemos: sweet, sweet apathy…

I mean, who really cares what you look like, or how you are, or what you do; that you look, or are, or do, at all, is the miracle…besides, who else has a more vested interest in you than You (& your Mama, sometimes, like on Easter Sunday mostly). Heck, if he’s found even one small place in this world where he’s given himself permission to just snap and smile and exist…then, who am I to complain or slander.  

The truth is he’s got some hold on happiness that the rest of us are too timid to take, I’d bet. (Or maybe he’s just “not all there” – if so, then god, would that I could be so lucky).

Thing is, he wasn’t seeking approval; he was being geuine…and though he didn’t need anything from me, by sharing that one genuine moment with me, with everyone he comes across today, with his snapping, he’s getting exactly what he’s putting out there…I mean, I smiled at him, for crying out loud…and it wasn’t really jealousy at his having the wherewithal to snap at will, it was appreciation for his humor, his laissez-faire, his “take on things”…

…and that, if I wanted to, I could be just like him; I’ve got two hands and a whole wide world of things to be grateful for. So why not snap my fingers instead of my attitude? I make too many wrong choices everyday, as it is…so on my way out the downstairs door of the library, I kept my smile front-and-center because I’d seen one of the good guys, you know…a bona fide, down-to-earth, honest-to-goodness good guy. 

And it made me happy.

I guess they haven’t died out, yet, this endangered species. But their numbers are dangerously low.

…though, they might add one more by the end of the day…I’m already grinning just thinking about it. 

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