Jesus at the Burger King

by David Arredondo (Dr.X)

Interstate Highway 89 crosses New Hampshire and leads to ski country in Vermont. During the winter it’s very crowded, but not nearly so much as the rare rest stops that seem to be mandatory for families and their children in frantic search for food, a place to pee or both. Hordes of parents and an endless stream of children pour from SUVs packed and strapped with all of the proper ski paraphernalia.

The children are crazed with excitement, hunger, and full bladders. In various states of undress from layers of ski clothes, they scatter towards fulfillment of whatever bodily need is the most pressing. Eventually, however, they all end up where I was standing – in line at the Burger King counter.

Except it wasn’t a line. It was a swarm of seething parents and kids.

Kids were clomping around in ski boots they couldn’t bear to take off. Hats and gloves were dropping everywhere. Parents frantically and fruitlessly were trying to keep track of their kids and their kids’ friends and two gloves and ski cap for each of them. They tried to keep their place in line and collect food preferences for the hungry, hot, sweaty, noisy part of the crowd that belonged to them.

Common courtesy was the first victim of this near-riot. Decorum and self-control followed. The harried adults went from bemused to irritated to outright out-of-control enraged.

It may be accurately described as an angry mob of American parents and children demanding not only what they wanted, when they wanted it; but also – as the jingle goes – wanting it their way.

The teens in orange and red polyester and their manager in his early thirties were faring no better in trying to govern the ungovernable. The parents, not wanting to yell at their kids’ friends, yelled at the employees instead. The managers, caught between “The customer is always right” and common sense, both got and gave their share of abuse. I can think of no greater definition of chaos than what was happening in the middle of that roadside Burger King that day.

And then I saw a man behind a register I have never forgotten.

He was older than the other employees, maybe in his late fifties; but it was far more than his age that set him apart. Like a second sleeve, his arms were decorated with tattoos long since faded from the youth in which he had sat for them.

Some were the classics of his time: A naked lady with the ace of diamonds; “Lucky Seven” dice; a torn heart with the jagged rip down the middle. “Live Free or Die” in a beautiful flowing script across the upper right forearm, done professionally. Others screamed PRISON in no uncertain terms – ballpoint ink etched in with a sewing needle. Daggers, LOVE – HATE across the knuckles of the four finger of each hand, crude crucifixes were filled in around the professional body art. Assorted initials, too.

Cadillac buyers and old Five and Dimers, the refrain of an old country song, played through my mind as I looked at him.

Years spent working in a psychiatric facility for addicts told me that he was recovering from at least one very severe addiction – probably alcohol, maybe heroin too. The scars on his face, neck and arms said he had been a fighter, too. His sinewy muscles indexed the years he had spent behind bars. He was not a big man, but he was strong and unafraid in the way only people who have survived real fear can be.

His had been a life lived hard. He looked much older than his years. But despite all of these outward signs of a rough-and-tumble New Hampshire Desperado, somehow he exuded peace and kindness to a degree that would be remarkable in any man, but was especially startling in him.

He stood calmly and assuredly behind one of the cash registers, taking orders, placing them and giving change, confidently smoothing out the crumpled bills that were dropped on the wet counter in front of him. He spoke softly and kindly both to the customers and to the teens in orange and red behind him. Nothing seemed to perturb him; on the contrary, the louder the clamor, the greater his calmness.

At first I noticed him as being the only calm presence in this chaos; but as I continued to watch him, I noticed that his peacefulness exuded outward until he was surrounded by an island of calm in the circle of people around him. Without saying a word other than the normal customer service banter, he created an eye in the middle of the storm that was threatening to drown the Burger King that Saturday.

How could a middle-aged ex-con working in a rest stop Burger King have such a powerful effect on literally everyone around him?

I stood and watched, transfixed by what I was seeing and was amazed when a wave of that calm, peaceful, subtle joy reached even me, more than 20 feet away. I became centered, present, clear and certain. Around him was a radius of adults and kids alike fell quiet, patient, calm and considerate of one another. It was if he were exuding peace by his very presence.

As if I had gotten what I had come for, I left the Burger King got back into my car.

“I just saw Jesus,” I said to my companion.