USA. A Mexican restaurant. We had not yet ordered anything, and the food was already arriving.
Chips. Salsa. Unrequested. Free.
I stopped the waiter. "We have not earned these."
"They just come with the table, man."
They come with the TABLE. In my land, hospitality is a debt. Every gift creates an obligation, weighed carefully, returned in the proper season with interest of feeling. Here, the gift arrives before you have even proven you can pay for dinner.
This is not an appetizer. This is a declaration: we trust you. Eat.
I ate with the gravity the moment deserved. And then — I must report this calmly — the basket emptied, and a new one appeared.
"Did we…?"
"Refill," the waiter said. "It's bottomless."
Bottomless. They have wells of salsa. The supply lines of this nation are beyond anything my ancestors imagined.
My friend warned me. "Don't fill up on chips, dude."
Too late. I had accepted three baskets. Honor demanded each one be finished — an unfinished gift is an insult. By the time my actual food arrived, I was a ruined man.
I was not hungry. I was not comfortable. I had been defeated by a courtesy.
Generosity that arrives before the request cannot be repaid. It can only be survived.
I know the rule now. I have made my peace with the basket. One basket. Two at the most.
Who am I deceiving. There is no number of baskets I would refuse. The trust of a nation is in that salsa, and I intend to honor all of it.
The deliberate inability of people to understand — on the day of SpaceX’s IPO no less — that Musk doesn’t actually have $1 trillion in cash to be grabbed by the revenuers and redistributors is kind of amazing.
With great excitement and pride, we are thrilled to announce the next Head Football Coach of the Pulaski County Maroons — JOSH ROBERTS!
Coach Roberts has dedicated more than 20 years to the Maroons Football Program at both the middle school and high school levels, pouring his passion, leadership, and commitment into generations of student-athletes.
There is no doubt that Coach Roberts is Maroon through and through. His dedication to our players, our community, and the tradition of Pulaski County Football makes him the right leader to continue building and strengthening a program that proudly competes at the highest level of 5A football.
Please join us in welcoming Coach Roberts into this role as we look forward to an exciting future for Maroon Football.
GO MAROONS!
#Limitless #PulaskiProduces
I've said it before. The future of American youth soccer is school soccer. Middle School and High School soccer needs to be grown into a legitimate outlet for players. Culturally, most kids and families already see High School soccer as bigger than club soccer. Why fight it?
The only person in all of the universe whose opinion counts considers you worth it enough to die for you.
To the degree you know this and let it settle to the bottom of your heart, your life will change.
Resentment is what unforgiveness looks like after it has settled in and made itself at home. It feels like justice but behaves like a slow poison. The only real cure is mercy, first received and then extended.