The Story About Eddie...

I got a story to tell ya about a man named Eddie. Before I can tell ya about Eddie, though, I gotta tell you a little something about Montana.

In case you don’t know, because you’re not from here, or because you’re not the type to set foot in certain establishments, either because you can’t or you won’t... most gas stations here in Montana have casinos in the back corner. They’re tucked away, outta sight... almost invisible if you’re not looking for ‘em. I’m not a gambler or casino kind of person, so at first, I didn’t realize how very present and prevalent these little back corner casinos are. Don’t get me wrong, there are signs for casinos at gas stations all over Montana, but I didn’t “see” the casinos in the back corners, until I did. Now I know, and now you know… most gas stations here in Montana have casinos in the back corner.

Some, but not all, of those back corner casinos have a bar in their back corner. A few of those back corner bars have a restaurant hitched to their back corner. So, sometimes, in some gas stations in Montana, there’s a casino, and a bar, and a restaurant…

You following me? Keep taking left turns if you’re not. You’ll either end up facing the door to the gas pumps or you’ll end up where I did… on a bar stool. That’s where I heard the story about Eddie at 1:50 in the afternoon on an unassuming Monday.

Before I can tell ya about Eddie, though, I gotta tell you about the bartender. I can’t remember her name exactly, which is a shame because she’s such a pivotal part of the story about Eddie. It was something like Joan, or Jan, or Joy… something like that. I’ll call her Joy because she was downright joyful. Beautiful, petite, young, tawny skin, big brown eyes, a smile that never turned flat… Native American or Arab heritage if I had to guess one; because we’re in Montana, probably more likely she’s Native American, but I’m not completely sure. Doesn’t matter. What does matter is that she was simply sublime. She flitted… floated... more than moved behind the bar… here, there, everywhere, always smiling.

I was impressed at her personal attention to each patron. Some, okay, let’s be honest... most, of the folks in the bar on a Monday afternoon, she knew by name and anticipated their poison. The one guy, in construction yellow, couldn’t even get his NA O’douls order out before she had the top popped and over the counter to him. (NA O’douls is a “near-beer” for y’all who don’t know. Considered non-alcoholic by state and federal regulations, may or may not be considered alcoholic depending on your personal opinion. Looks like a beer, smells like beer, tastes like beer, is it a beer? At the very least, it’s near beer...). An older woman came in and Joy was absolutely delighted to see her and show her the new earrings her husband had made! I’m not a big earring person, but my daughter, Tatum, makes earrings, and Joy was so excited, I couldn’t help but have my interest piqued. They were stunning earrings, not that I can remember much about them now. They were either butterflies or hummingbirds and, though I can’t remember which, or what was so remarkably intricate about them, I remember thinking her husband must have had her in mind when he handcrafted them. Floating, flittering, simply, sublime… This story is about him. Her husband is Eddie.

Before I can tell ya about Eddie, though, I gotta tell ya how it was I found myself on a bar stool, on a Monday afternoon, in the back corner, of a back corner that, after all that corner talk, turns out to be nothing more the front, right-hand side of a gas station as you’re facing the gas pumps… I told ya, just keep takin’ left turns ;)

Anyway, back then, Monday was my only day off, so really it was more like a Saturday than an unassuming Monday in my world. I was working 60+ hours a week, most of ‘em outta town. The twenty hours in town, during the rest of the world’s weekend, were hard-on-my-body, manual-labor type hours. I hadn’t done manual labor type work for pay since I got my college degree decades before. I was the type that paid a membership to go to a gym to do manual labor. My profession was “intellectual” and my body needed to stay healthy. I wasn’t going to get any health benefits from the work I did with my mind, so I went to a gym. Then I found myself working weekends at a gym, cleaning it from top to bottom. Back breaking work for one such as I had become. How I got from being a “professional with a desk job” to woman working 60+ hours a week, doesn’t matter. It’s not pertinent to the story about Eddie.

You probably know by now though, that before I can tell ya about Eddie, I gotta tell ya about something else. This time, I gotta tell ya about a guy I was sweet on back then (still am, actually, not that it matters much to this story). He was sitting on the bar stool to my right when I heard the story about Eddie. He knew that Monday was my Saturday and after a 40 hour “intellectual” work week out of town, I did 20 hours of manual labor in town and was downright pooped by Monday, my only day off. I’d asked him to sometimes surprise me on my days off with something novel that I didn’t have to plan, just had to show up for. So he took me to a restaurant in a gas station…

I have a thing for wings. I like ‘em. I know they’re not healthy for me, but they’re good, so I eat them, and I like it. I’d heard about that particular restaurant sometime back from some former co-workers. They swore that restaurant, Bob’s, or Al’s, or JD’s or something like that, had surprisingly good food for being a gas station restaurant. I believed them, sort of, but never got around to proving them right or wrong. My guy heard about the place too from his co-workers. Evidently this little gas station restaurant has especially good wings, according to his work buddy. He knows I like wings and novelty. What’s more novel than wings in a gas station, casino, dive-bar, restaurant at lunchtime on a Monday?

Joy took our order and was as delighted to help us decide on our wing sauce as she’d been to show the older lady Eddie’s earrings. She got advice from the cook and other patrons on what sauce the new folks should try. I can’t remember what a single one of them suggested, or what we settled on, but the wings were saucy, and that’s all that mattered… when they finally came out. I said it was lunchtime earlier, but that’s not exactly the truth. It was a tad bit later than I like to have lunch and I was hungry, downright, impatient-like hungry.

 Joy mindfully, and of course... joyfully, brought our drinks, one hot with honey, one a banquet in a bottle, one after the other. She wasn’t one to judge what anyone ordered to drink in a bar on a Monday afternoon. She just served them with that enchanting smile of hers. Her cheer, grace, and attentive conversation almost distracted from the fact that our drinks were almost done before the wings were out… almost, but not quite.

By the time the wings came, I was ready to eat, but first... honestly out of obedience, more than desire that day, I bowed my head and my guy doffed his hat to pray. I said words quickly. Words I’d said a million times before in about a million different variations. Something like “LORD bless this food to our use, and thank You for it.” (I probably especially thanked him for chickens, but I can’t remember, it doesn’t matter.) I finished with something like, “Please bless those who prepared and served this delicious fried food and beverage. In Jesus’ name, amen.”

“You’re prayin’ folks,” Joy said, more than asked, from the kitchen end of the bar as she floated back to us on Holy Spirit’s wind and her invisible wings.
“We are,” I said with a smile, as I dipped my wing in ranch or bleu cheese, I can’t remember which. I can remember it didn’t pair well with whatever sauce I also can’t remember... doesn’t matter. What does matter is what Joy said next.

“Will you pray for my husband Eddie?,” she asked, then, in between moments of serving other patrons, who already knew the story, she told us the story about Eddie...

No sense in stringing you along any longer. This time I’ll come right out with it and tell you. You see, Eddie had lived a rough life. Got himself a reputation, then in trouble, then locked up. I’m not sure what exactly he did, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that either in prison the first time, or after prison, or when he had to go back in for what Joy says he says he didn’t do that last time, but at sometime in the midst of everything that is Eddie’s story to tell... Eddie found God. Or more likely, God, Good Shepherd He is, found Eddie.

Eddie, a lost sheep, who loves a hummingbird or butterfly, who serves barflies, needs prayer. Eddie’s coming up for parole this September. She asked us to pray he got out. Like I mentioned before, Joy says Eddie says he didn’t do anything to get locked up that last time. “Guilty by reputation, or association” or something like like that. She’s adamant he shouldn’t be locked up and the beautiful butterfly with the boldness of a lioness, isn’t afraid to ask prayin’ folks to pray.

She reminded me of the Bible, only maybe more tangible. There’s a part somewhere in there that says something about us (that’d be God’s children) not being anxious, but rather bringing our requests to God. She certainly didn’t present as one anxious for anything, what with that smile she never lost and that joy I remember her by. She also wasn’t concerned about sharing any of the fine details of Eddie’s story. She just wanted more of “us” to bring a prayer, a petition, to God that Eddie would be paroled.

There’s another part in the Bible that says we can approach God boldly because Jesus paid our admission price, or something like that. I’d like to say I’m not one to judge, after all there’s that whole bit about me being in a gas station, casino, dive-bar and on a Monday afternoon, nonetheless; but if I’m honest, I did judge… I’m sure you can think all the same things I was thinking about Eddie, and have your own thoughts about someone like me being asked to pray for someone like Eddie, and if God would even think about hearing prayers from people like us…

I’d like to think bar stool prayers are some of His favorites, so, I put my judgment down and asked if I could pray right then and there. I told you she was joyful, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything more beautiful than someone that excited to pray in my life. We had church right there in a bar. She took care of a tab of a patron first then bowed her head with me as we let her request be known to God again, only this time together, in fellowship, two or three gathered together in Jesus’ name... for Eddie.

Jesus advocates for me when the accuser sees me walk in a bar and condemns me for being nothing but a barfly on a bar stool. He tells His Father, I’m His, I’m free. I walk daily in that freedom that fights against the accusations that I’m nothing worth saving. Jesus advocates for Eddie when his accusers judge him, admittedly me among them. He tells His Father, Eddie’s His, Eddie’s free.

So let it be, in Jesus’ name that the story about Eddie may ever and always be that he is free!