Sales Calls and other thoughts...

I just had the most interesting conversation with a lady doing sales calls. She was selling life, health and supplemental insurance. I kept trying to get off the phone or think of an excuse to hang up on her but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. After she was finally done giving me her spiel she informed me I would be transferred to someone else who would get me signed up. Then she told me to wait, that there would be a few seconds of silence. Great, I thought, that will be my out. I’ll hang up then and not offend anyone; but before I could do so she started asking me about the weather where I was at. I closed my eyes as I realized she had no intention of letting me wait in silence. She was going to sit on the phone, gabbing at me to keep the line connected.
She’s from Illinois apparently. She described to me how bad the flooding had been there recently. She informed me that Barak O’Bama helped sandbag the Mississippi river and, by the way, did I know that presidential candidates got special agents just like the actual president. No, I didn’t know this. By this time I couldn’t help but smile and I half wondered if I was overhearing this conversation, and she wasn’t really talking to me but to a co-worker. She just forgot to disconnect me. But I wasn’t just overhearing this; she was really talking to me as if we were in the break room having coffee.
So I sat back, closed my book, and listened as she told me about her somewhat new convertible that needed rotors, carpooling with her roommate, a bridge built in 1976 closed due to the flooding, that she couldn’t wait till payday next week so she could by some food, and a hamburger sounded really good at that moment because she was hungry. I chuckled under my breath as I tried to keep up with this woman’s one-sided dialogue. I found myself actually enjoying this sales call for insurance I had no intention of buying.
Then she threw me for a loop and asked me what I did for a living. I told her I’m a mom and wife and I stay at home with my kids. Her voice softened when she replied, “Oh, that’s what my Mama always wanted to be. She always said she wanted to be like Donna Reed and just stay home with her kids, but she had to work two jobs. Today is the anniversary of her death.” My heart thudded to a stop. Her death? This was not a typical sales call at all.
The cynical part of me thought this was probably a gimmick, but then I wasn’t so sure. I was about to ask her a specific question concerning her mother’s death but didn’t have to because she offered it freely. “My Mama died of leukemia and was in the process of having a bone marrow transplant. She fought it for fourteen months before she passed on. I’m just glad she isn’t in pain anymore.” At that moment she was cut off and the insurance agent came on the line. I was frustrated that I had lost contact with the woman. I almost asked him to transfer me back to her, but I didn’t. I told him no thank you and hung up, my ears still ringing from the woman’s voice and the details of her life she shared so freely.
How many people do we come in contact with during the day, never giving a thought to them, their lives, or their families? I do it everyday, all day long. I say things under my breath at the slow driver in front of me. Then I pass the person, glance back before I pull ahead and see an elderly woman barely able to see over the steering wheel, gripping it for dear life.
I glare at the kids who step out in front of my car, not looking for traffic. Then I wonder how many times my children have done the same thing to other drivers. These kids have parents who want them home safe and sound.
As a mom and wife my thoughts are so full of my own life, chores that need finishing when I get home, a bill I forgot to pay, bedtimes, church functions. A million and one things are running through my mind and I forget about the many other people in this world. I pray for strength to get through the day when a woman from across the country has lost her mother, drives an old convertible and can’t wait for payday so she can have a hamburger.
How small is my life? What about that little old lady I sped past today? Is this her first time driving without her husband there to coach her? And the kids that walked in front of my car. What were their stories? They each have one. Maybe one was thinking of the impending divorce of his parents. Maybe the girl was wondering how she would tell her parents she was pregnant. Maybe the bubbly chatter was a cover-up for the insecurities each girl possessed.
I get so caught up in my life, in my duties and I wonder how many times I miss out on praying for those around me. I wanted to ask the sales lady if her mother knew Jesus. I didn’t get to. I may not be able to touch every single person out there but the least I can do is pray for them, keeping my eyes open to see the ones around me, even the ones I don’t know. It’s amazing how big life becomes when I look beyond myself, my own issues, and think of others first.
Just a thought…