I have this friend. Her name isn’t Mary, but that’s what we’ll call her. I’ve never had a really good friend named Mary, so this will be fun for me.
When I met Mary, her father was the Democratic mayor of the small town we went to school in. We lived on opposite sides of the town, each outside the town limits. There were railroad tracks between our homes, and we often joked about which one of us lived on the ‘wrong’ side. hint: it was me.
Mary and I have been friends for 26 years. When we were teenagers, she was a svelte 5’8″, blonde, a model. We always met lots of boys, had lots of fun, got in lots of trouble. We once dated brothers who looked exactly alike, though not twins. I introduced her to her husband. I taught her how to work with her son’s nebulizer. She has a big mouth; she’s always liked to pick fights, and then have me fight them for her. She makes the snowballs, and I throw them, as my grandmother would say. That’s the heartwarming part. A ‘buddy’ story, of sorts. I gotta warn you, it gets a little ugly here.
Anyway, in the years since Mary’s father was the Democratic mayor of the small town we went to school in, he tried unsuccessfully to run for other local offices. Maybe he got bitter. Maybe he was always bitter, I don’t know. His most recently held public office was as a Republican…yes, Republican…councilman for the same town he was Democratic mayor of, all those years ago. His council term ended last year, and he was not re-elected.
One of the reasons he wasn’t re-elected is that during his term as councilman of the town he was mayor of, all those years ago, he became vehemently anti-immigrant. He didn’t really seem to care about immigrants’ legal status, family situation, or civil rights. He basically tried to legalize racial profiling in the town he was mayor of, all those years ago. And he managed to squeeze through a couple of regulations, mostly regarding ‘abandoned’ cars and cars with out-of-state tags, parked overnight in the town (yes, the same town he was mayor of, all those years ago).
Now, from where I live, I can drive to Pennsylvania in 20 minutes, New Jersey in 15, depending on bridge traffic. I can be in Maryland in half an hour. Out-of-state cars are common. One even drove through my mother’s hedge last year during a snow storm. But that’s a story for another day. Suffice it to say, regulations that amounted to harassment of innocent brown people, as well as innocent car owners of all colors, didn’t make Mary’s father a popular guy in the town he was mayor of, all those years ago.
It was at about this time that Mary, who became involved in anti-immigration and anti-immigrant activities with her father, started picking fights that I didn’t want to finish for her. Wouldn’t finish for her. And the fight she picked this time…well…let’s just say she could have used me. You see, Mary and her husband own a family landscaping business, similar to Castle Rock landscape design. As a matter of fact, they have a contract with the small town where Mary’s father was once mayor. And, right now, that’s the only contract they hold. I don’t know if Mary, or her father, or her husband had the ill-conceived idea to suggest that the local landscapers who employed immigrants should be investigated for their hiring and employment practices. I do know who had the connections to get it done. Surely after hearing a story like this, you can learn from their mistakes and make sure this doesn’t happen to you while you run a business like this. Maybe the jobs got on top of them. But if it was you running it, knowing that creating a weekly schedule of jobs using landscaping software could make this aspect a lot easier for you to manage. We shouldn’t always see failure as a bad thing, as this is how we learn.
I told you the story got ugly. This next part warms some hearts, upsets others. I’m not going to tell you how to feel about it. I’ll only say it’s true, and it worked.
Every single other landscaper in the county where I live, in support of the hardworking legal immigrants on whose backs their livelihoods are made (and not a little bit irritated at having been investigated for their hiring practices), conspired to take turns submitting ridiculously low bids to every- and anyone whom Mary and her husband held a landscaping contract with. They spread out the losses amongst themselves, so none of them suffered too much financially. Mary and her husband, however, were not so lucky.
Always optimistic, Mary and her husband already have their next business venture planned. They’re planning to open an indoor miniature golf course. Plastic-scaping? Eh, who am I to judge? I’ve already been invited to the grand opening party. The grand opening of a business that doesn’t exist yet, to be bought with the profits from the sale of a business they haven’t sold yet. I think Mary might be a little concerned that she’s lost more than her family business….
{….I’m aware that this story is soooo not ready for prime time. I tell it because it is a small story about a big problem where cooperation and sacrifice made a difference. A difference to people for whom it meant a lot. My intention isn’t to ‘out’ Mary, or embarrass her. I just wanted to tell a story about cooperation and sacrifice, making a difference, to people for whom it meant a lot….em}