On Purpose

I just finished reading Being Mortal, a thoughtful take on medicine’s broken approach to aging and death. For a topic that sounds morose, I found it quite heartwarming. Two things struck me: one, the families, couples, and patients interviewed find strength and courage through purpose and two, cancer sucks.

One chapter tells the story of a former doctor and his wife who move into a retirement community. He’s 87; she’s about the same. He occasionally chokes on food. She is all but blind. They go out for a walk, arm in arm, when she topples over and breaks both fibulas. He takes care of her while she convalesces in a wheelchair.

I’ll stop there because I don’t want to ruin the ending. Suffice to say they hop in a pool, are restored to their younger selves, and leave this planet with aliens who promise them eternal life. [If you’re under 50 or didn’t spend your childhood watching 80s movies , click here.]

What I found especially thought provoking, besides the nifty healing pool is that, despite the their advanced ages, they are happy because they each have a sense of purpose. “He found great purpose in caring for her, and she, likewise, found great meaning in being there for him… He dressed her, bathed her, helped feed her. When they walked, they held hands. At night, they lay in bed in each other's arms, awake and nestling for a while, before finally drifting to sleep.”

Aren’t they cute? 

The doctor also enjoys helping those around him. To wit: after moving into the community he helped a fledgling doctor conduct her first research study, created a bookclub for retired physicians, and served on the community’s health committee. Wherever this guy goes, he makes life a little better.

What a jerk.

——-

When I started my first real job, I went through two weeks of training [partying]. New-hires from around the world came to St. Charles, a quiet suburb about an hour outside of Chicago by train. There we learned how to be a consultant and comport ourselves in a professional setting. Our curriculum included, “How to write functional requirements documentation,” “How to drink at the on-campus bar,” “How to give a presentation hungover,” and, for the international students, “How to teach Americans jolly drinking songs.” I audited the last one every night.

During the course of our training [indoctrination], we learned about the company’s core values. I’ve forgotten most of them—too many late nights singing with the Italians—but one stuck with me: Beer.

No, wait…Stewardship.

I’ve always liked the idea of stewardship. Whenever I went camping as a kid, I hated finding garbage in the woods and telling my brother to pick it up. I liked the idea of stewardship, not the doing of it. That wouldn’t come until a few years later.

——-

One day in middle school, Mr. McCoy, our history teacher, burst into the religion classroom. “I need four boys.” 

Mrs. Lenth protested. “I’m trying to teach religion. Can this can wait until recess?” 

“This is a Catholic school, Celeste. If they haven’t gotten the gist by now, there’s no saving them.”

He surveyed his stock and, before Mrs. Lenth could protest again, called out four names. “Matt, Mark, John, and … Anthony.” Had our class contained a Luke, I wouldn’t have made the cut.

He didn’t explain why he needed four, or why he needed boys, but I was one of The Chosen and this was my ticket out of class. I wasn’t about to look this Irish gift horse in the mouth. 

“Follow me.” He turned and sped out the door. We put our belongings in our lockers and followed. 

We emerged into the warm sunlight like prisoners escaping prison. We felt free. 

McCoy reminded us we weren’t. “Let’s go, boys!”

“Where is he?” Mark said. He squinted and searched the parking lot.

John spotted him. “There, in the distance.” Mr. McCoy was halfway to the baseball field. He moved quick for a man who gave lectures with his hands crossed on his paunch.

We formed a single file line. Matt said, “Left…left…left, right, left.” 

I sang, “That’s the sound…” 

The others harmonized, “…of the men, working on the chain…gayayayang.”

As we reenacted my favorite scene from Cadence, I wondered why he’d chosen us. Were we in trouble? Was it because, except for me, we were named after the apostles? And the gospels? [Religion class wasn’t a total waste.] Were we the four coolest boys in class? Yes. That was probably it. 

Our marching song proved prescient. Mr. McCoy opened the gate around the baseball field and ushered us inside. It was dotted with litter—the diamond, the outfield, the no-man’s-land between the backstop and the neighbor’s fence.

Our job, Mr. McCoy explained, was, “to clean up this mess. And I do mean all of it. None of your usual half-ass.” 

“Not a problem, SIR,” I shouted. “We will give it nothing but our full-ass.” 

“Sarcasm will get you nowhere, LeDonne.” [Author’s note: while most of this story is fabricated embellishment, he did tell me this once. To this day, I still don’t know if he was being sarcastic.]

He explained that the night before, someone had torn dozens of pages from porn magazines and littered them on the field. We needed to pick it up before the other students spent their recess reading it and their 20s in therapy.

What a rollercoaster of pubescent emotions. Imagine being a 13-year-old boy forced to skip class—YAY!—only to be told you were working on a chain gang—NO!—but then you find that the trash contains images of things you didn’t even know humans did to each other, showing parts you’d never seen and some of us still haven’t seen—YAY!—but that it was a sopping mess from being rained on the night before—NO!

But after the rollercoaster passed, and after we cleaned the field, I felt good. It could have been the sense of pride in cleaning up garbage, or the tug in the trousers each time I picked up a page, but we left that baseball field in a better condition than when we found it.

And I thought, Could I leave any place or, even better, the world, better than when I found it?

I’m trying. 

My purpose is to leave the world with a few more smiles in it than when I arrived. It is, in a sense, stewardship.

It drives me. It’s driven me to say “Yes” whenever an old lady asks if I can push her wheelchair across the street. It’s driving me right now to finish this damn newsletter. And it’ll continue to drive me to make someone else’s life a little better. Who knows, maybe someday my wife and I will walk arm in arm when I’ll suddenly tip over and break both fibulas. She’s going to need someone to keep make her laugh while she hoses me down for my daily bath.

That’s my purpose. What’s yours?