Guest Post: Sam Van Eman: “Don’t Whistle While You Work.”

The delightful Sam Van Eman is a kindred spirit of mine. He is the author of On Earth As It Is In Heaven, is an editor at The High Calling, and blogs at New Breed of Advertisers. He has a unique combination of wit, compassion and zeal. Love this piece that he shared here.


I banged on the insulated door but had known as soon as the latch clicked behind me that I’d have to get out of the refrigerator another way. In the dark, I turned to the right, reaching through the wire shelving to feel along the wall behind it. 
When I found what I needed, I pulled cases of eggs off the shelf, slid pancake batter aside and climbed on top of the rack. The metal numbed my fingers. I pressed against the small loading window halfway up the wall and squeezed through onto the floor of the McDonald’s restaurant.

“Nice, Chuck,” I said. “I should have seen it coming. Just watch your back today.”

He laughed and the manager looked over the hood of the grill to check on us.

“Nothing to see here,” we assured her. Susan was middle-aged and sour. She never let me whistle while I cooked. I should have respected her but half of the time I couldn’t help it, and the other half I did it to push her buttons. Why couldn’t we enjoy these minimum wage hours?

I returned to my station and mumbled to Chuck again, “Just watch your back.”

Managers like Susan moved me around as needed in the 4:00-8:30 shift. I was polite with customers which often landed me at the front counter and occasionally in drive-through, but for the most part I made burgers and chicken sandwiches with a few guys from high school, Chuck included. We liked our jobs.

The dinner crowd began to show and by 5:00 we were calling orders, communicating with the front counter, confirming special requests, and spinning utensils like Japanese chefs. Chuck and I worked smoothly together, passing on the right, dressing a dozen sandwiches at a time with cadence, now arranging fresh patties, now wrapping our work for the public, all the while restocking condiments and vegetables from the walk-in refrigerator.

The customer swell demanded concentration and eventually made Chuck loosen his vigil. He added lettuce to buns on the counter and asked me to replenish the pickles for him. “Got it,” and I raced off to the cooler.

Inside again, the din of timers and sizzling meat and metal trays went quiet as I reached for the pickles. I turned and stared at the eggs for a moment and then tucked one in the palm of my left hand. I exited with Chuck’s request, set the container next to his work, and with one swift move of extended fingers opened his back pocket and let the egg drop in. Before he could react, I smacked him.

I was already laughing.

Susan hollered from the front, “I need those burgers!” I tried to stifle the hilarity as Chuck fumbled with what to do. The wet was seeping through the pocket and down his pant leg—cold slime touching his skin—but the dinner rush hadn’t let up. He cursed at me and at himself for letting me out of his sight.

I went back to whistling and Susan passed by and begged me to stop. The request sounded desperate, so I stopped.

College came and so did some maturity. Years later, I ran into Susan at a grocery store. She asked how I was doing and then, of all things, she thanked me. While I had remembered annoyance and interpersonal conflict, she somehow remembered bits of encouragement, quieter moments of listening, willingness to fill in staffing gaps, and diligence. And she remembered that I tried to connect those things with my faith. What did I know about her depression, or about her silent wish that I could play more at work?  

I felt bad about giving her grief; I certainly can’t deny the occasional childishness. But perhaps my asunder of workplace provocations paid off after all. If nothing else, I got an egg in Chuck’s pocket.