In the Office Again

Do you have back to school blues or are you happy it has started?  For me, I hated school.  I could not wait for graduation May 27, 1971.  It took forever.  I hated homework.  I hated reading.  I hated writing.  I enjoyed history.  I loved math, algebra, electric computation (forerunner of computers) and football.  I wished I had enjoyed dating, but I could not buy a date.  My ex sister-in-law convinced a girl to date me. Did I say I hated school?

With that said, I returned to school in September 1983 at the University of Montevallo.  Having the call of the Lord resonating in my heart, I walked onto the hallow ground and cobbled streets of the Quad, the Tower, and Palmer Hall.  There I encountered Ms. Cobb; her husband was from Demopolis, who asked if she could help me.  I must have looked as a “plowboy” come to town.  I did not know it, but the Lord did because it was orientation.

I was eager to share my exciting call to minister and returning to school to help me be a pastor.  I realized she was one of the liberated people of the eighties and she was not impressed with my call, but she was very helpful.  She taught English and helped me to write when I attended the Harbert Writing Center, a place for those whose English skills were nonexistent.

I was very ignorant about writing and college and Ms. Cobb saw me as a project to teach me the ways of the secular university and launch me into the agnostic twentieth century.  She did enlighten me on Pell Grants.  These grants were money that the government loans to students without having to pay the money back to the government.  Boy, she was nice, liberated woman.

A couple of years later I was going to Palmer Hall to pick up my Pell Grant.  The lines were long with students getting their money.  The line reached from the second floor, down the stairs, through the main lobby, onto the steps, and out into the streets. These were transitional days from punch cards to computers.

It was hot in Palmer Hall.  The temperature was hot, and students were getting hot under the collar due to the slowness of those operating the computers.

I finally reached the top of the stairs and could see the payroll window.  People were angry so I decided to make a joke about computers.  I said in my preaching voice, “Boy ain’t the technological age wonderful in how it speeds things up or we would be here pulling cards all night.”

After that, everyone started telling computer jokes and the line moved quickly.  When I was close to receiving my check, a woman behind the counter said she wanted to talk to me in her office.  She looked upset. How did she know me?  My first thought was, “What I have I done now?”  Trouble follows me as a dirty cloud follows Pigpen.  You know the dirty little follow from the Peanuts cartoon.

With high anxiety, I entered onto “the carpet” of her office.  She closed the door and said, “Thank you for what you did.”  I was clueless as to what I did so I asked her what I did.

She said, “You took what was a very volatile situation and made everyone laugh.  The girl doing the student loans was nervous and the more upset the students became, the more mistakes she made.  Your smile and your humor put everyone at ease.  You took the attention off the computer operators.”

I told the woman that it was better to have a smile and share it than be one to gripe and complain.  It was a joy to get money to follow God’s call upon my life.

Author and Bible teacher Warren Wiersbe writes, Joy takes the burden out of service.  The Joy of the Lord is your strength (Nehemiah 8:10). God loves a cheerful servant as well as a cheerful giver . . . God wants His family to be happy, and this means that each member must contribute to joy.