Friday is my day off. And by “day off,” I mean that I’m off from teaching but not from working. The “to do” list is never empty. Instead, Fridays have become alternative work days, filled with overflow from whatever doesn’t get done throughout the week. That usually includes domestic things like cleaning, laundry and supermarket errands. Chores are divided by meals with friends or time with students. Some come over at my request and others invite themselves.
Yesterday seemed to have its fair share of guests. Andrew, a former student, has been practically begging me to give him something to do. He and I have been friends since my first year here (at which point I was his teacher), and he knows that he’s always welcome at my place. Though he’s enjoying a much lighter schedule this semester, he has discovered that there’s not enough healthy activity on campus to fill his down time. For the past two weeks, he has sent me detailed copies of his schedule with reminders that he can be of assistance at any time that he’s not in class. I finally turned his hint into an invitation to help me with some translations yesterday afternoon. He arrived an hour early.
The soldier was scheduled to meet me later in the afternoon. I needed help extracting some files from a portable hard drive, and his was the first number I dialed. His IT major isn’t the defining reason for my request; I try to integrate him into healthy social scenarios as often as possible. He spends an inordinate amount of time on the internet, particularly bound to an interactive online game called Crossfire (known as “CF” here). It’s very probable that the majority of times when I am bringing his name before the Father, he’s hunched over his desktop, engaged in a virtual battle. The sobering thought is that there is a simultaneous real battle just beyond his realm of perception.
He knocked on the door at 2:30. I just happened to be standing right beside it when he arrived, so I knocked back in the same rhythm. I heard him chuckle on the other side, and then he let himself in. I smiled as he stepped into the kitchen.
Some time later, after the hard drive had been accessed, the boys were talking about how they each met me. The soldier smiled as he said that our first encounter involved me ripping into him about being late. “I remember that day,” I responded, “because you walked into class like some kind of rock star, with your trail of cigarette smoke following you.” I stood up and did my best imitation of his entrance, and his eyes crinkled as he laughed.
The other boy asked, “How long have you been smoking?”
“About two years,” said the soldier.
I kept quiet, knowing that he started around the time that his mother died.
“Why do you smoke?” continued Andrew.
“Because it helps me relax and because it feels good.”
Andrew casually protested, “But you could do other things to relax, like run or walk or something.”
“But I don’t want to,” he exclaimed with smile.
At that point, I made unbreakable eye contact with the soldier and said, “You know, you say that now because you have youth and health on your side. But if you continue, it’s going to kill you.”
“Maybe not,” he retorted. “Do you know who Deng Xiao Ping is?” (DXP is former leader of the Party here in China and is most well known for his economic reforms.)
I did and nodded in my understanding.
The soldier continued, “He smoked every day and lived to be a very old man.”
I grinned like a poker player who holds a royal flush.
“Do you know what a risk is?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he answered cautiously. He knew my mind was circling him.
“Would you agree with me that being a soldier is taking a risk? I mean, you put your life on the line when you sign up for the military.”
“Yes, it’s a risk,” he agreed.
“So once you become a soldier, your life will be at greater risk than many people’s, right?”
Once again, he agreed.
“And now you are choosing to add risk on top of risk by not only being a soldier, but by being a smoking soldier. Do you honestly expect to live very long with that kind of multiplication?” I asked.
He had nothing to say.
At that moment, I was sitting in a chair not far from him. My eyes pleaded with him while I softly said, “You know I say this because I care about you, and I want you to grow into an old man who doesn’t spent his last years being connected to an oxygen machine.”
His playfulness disappeared and he looked back at me with a subtle shadow of appreciation. “I know. It’s not the first time you’ve said this to me.”
He remembered our conversation from months ago -- the same conversation that made the back page of a recent newsletter.
Andrew stepped into the kitchen for a drink refill, and while he was out of earshot, I delicately said to the soldier, “And I know your mom isn’t here anymore to tell you this, but I think she’d want me to speak for her...so I am.”
He accepted it with a simple nod, and that’s how we ended that chapter of conversation. He soon departed for class (which he attended only under the threat of a possible quiz) and likely reached for his lighter the minute he walked out of the building.
Do I want him to quit smoking? Yes. I want him to live and live abundantly.
Do I want him to abandon the games and, instead, pursue real relationships with flesh and blood people? Without a doubt.
And there is a time and place (like yesterday) to remind him of the importance of those things. It shows that I care about his well-being. That is part of comprehensive Love.
But in my pleadings on his behalf, I ask not so much for what I want to disappear from his life, but for what I hope will one day emerge and shine far brighter than his worldly alliances.
Perish the day that I focus more on his symptoms and not on the cancer within.
