I come from a family where gravy
is considered a beverage.
ERMA BOMBECK
Twice a week James Enns and I enjoy lunch together after exercising for twenty minutes on machines intended for gerbils. I The meal is really an incentive. We can’t stand the thought of exercise without immediate reward, and so we hold it in front of us, like the weekend on a Monday. Recompense gives purpose to our exercise.
When we were children, we ran ten miles a day without knowing it, kicking a ball or being chased by Mr. Pike for sampling his raspberries. But not anymore. No one plays sports these days unless their parents organize it. There’s too much on television.
James and I talked for some time about beginning an exercise program but were distracted by other things. After all, we are busy guys. James is a year away from completing his PhD from Cambridge. My schedule keeps me weeks away from a nervous breakdown. Then one day I stepped on the scales and thought to myself, Hey, I’d like to live to be fifty-five and have all parts of my body stop moving when I do.
And so I called James, who agreed that I needed help and that he would join me.
Contrary to what I say in chapter 34, exercise is a good thing and we’re wise to grab some of it each day. Also, we should eat right. It won’t kill us. Those who subsist on french fries and Cheetos risk having a heart attack each time the toast pops up. I once saw pictures in National Geographic of a somewhat wizened Russian man who, though he had no documents to prove it, estimated his age to be 120 years, give or take a few. He said the secret to his longevity was a pound of bacon at breakfast, a shot of vodka at lunchtime, and lots and lots of unfiltered cigarettes throughout the day.
There are three things I know for sure about this:
He is the exception.
He was probably lying.
He was probably twenty-nine.
The thing I like about exercise is the same thing I like about banging my head against a stone wall: It feels good when I stop. But it’s worth it for those meals we enjoy together in the little sub sandwich shop near the exercise room.
We are unlikely friends, James and I. The similarity in our sandwiches ends with the chicken and the mayo. He loves red peppers and jalapeños and Mother-in-Law hot sauce. I get heartburn just watching him order. James dislikes pickles. This is a spiritual problem he has. I eat pickles by the fistful. He prefers Coke with ice. I go without.
James is an Anglican. I am Evangelical Free. He is a scholar. I am not. He can debate circles around me. It’s like Plato and Steve Martin doing lunch. Steve knows that the next best thing to being wise is to hang out with someone who is. I try to keep up as James discusses the theological ramifications of the big bang theory, but since I personally invented attention deficit disorder back in 1966, the Big Bang makes me think of Mr. Big chocolate bars, which reminds me that I didn’t get my wife anything for her birthday on Saturday, which is the day of the week we were married back in 1982, the very year the Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl, which makes me think of quarterbacks, which makes me wonder if I have enough spare change for coffee this afternoon.
I interrupt. “Did you hear about the crisis in Colombia?”
He frowns. “You’ve got ranch dressing on your nose,” he says.
Real friends do that. They point out mustard on your mustache and tea leaves in your teeth and inconsistencies in your spiritual life. James and I don’t agree on every little point, so mostly we stick to the ones that matter. We bow together before each meal, like saplings that have learned the best way to deal with the north wind, asking God to bless and protect our wives and children and to make us a blessing too.
“Lord, in a world where many go hungry, we thank You for food. Where many walk alone, we thank You for friends. Where many long for healing, we thank You for hope.”
What began as exercise has become a sacred friendship I would not trade for all the chocolate in Hershey, Pennsylvania.
I am sometimes asked why I live in a small town where everyone knows where you’re going before you turn your signal light on. The opportunities are golden elsewhere. And then I think of the words C. S. Lewis wrote in a letter: “Friendship is the greatest of worldly goods. Certainly to me it is the chief happiness of life. If I had to give a piece of advice to a young man about a place to live, I think I should say, ‘Sacrifice almost everything to live where you can be near your friends.’ I know I am very fortunate in that respect.”
I wish for everyone a friend like James, a friend to hold us accountable and soak us in community.
“As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend,” wrote Solomon in Proverbs 27:17 (NLT). Solomon must have had a James in his life. I wonder if they went out for submarine sandwiches. I imagine they were long lunches. After all, Solomon had his share of wives to pray for.