Lessons From The World’s Greatest Greeter

Dennis Garvin
Dennis Garvin

My first encounter with Willie was around 4 years ago.  My granddaughter was living with us quite a bit and my mornings began with driving her over to day care.  On those mornings, the route takes me past Willie’s self-assigned duty station twice.  He is there every morning at a fast food place on a busy corner of Peters Creek Road.  He is either standing like a lone sentry, or pacing like a soldier providing perimeter security for his platoon.

Willie is perhaps in his mid-thirties. Above average height and with heavy muscular shoulders. I suspect he is intimidating to some – until they see his smile.

When I say that Willie is there every morning, I mean every morning.  He is there in all seasons, from the microwave heat of summer to the leaden cold of winter.  He is on station by 7AM.

What does Willie do?  He waves.  At every one.  All the time.  Usually it is a prolonged single hand wave, but always a double hand wave to the busloads of children that pass.  If you are close by and stuck by the traffic light, Willie will say ‘Hey, Buddy. How you doin’, buddy?  You havin’ a good day, buddy?’, waving all the time until the light goes green.  If my granddaughter is in the back seat, she, too, is a ‘buddy.’

I have become accustomed to Willie and a day without his greeting is vaguely ncomplete.  Once, after he had been absent for two whole days, I pulled into the restaurant to ask after him.  That was how I learned his name.  He was inside getting warm before heading back out into a winter morning of busy salutations.

I am proud of, and grateful to, this restaurant.  They have not chased Willie off their premises or tormented him for distracting the customers.  In fact, once every week, Willie appears at his jobsite clad in the restaurant uniform.  He is employed by them for a few hours to help with unloading delivery trucks.  Before and after his shift, however, he is at his post.

He lives in an apartment complex perhaps a half mile walk from his street corner position.  I have been there early enough to see him coming.  His pace increases as he nears the restaurant and he is nearly galloping.  He has a big anticipatory smile and his eyes, shining like a child’s on Christmas morning, are fixed on His corner.

Why does he stick in my mind and why does the thought of him conjure my respect and admiration?  Perhaps it is just that I hold, in my memory, visions of Willie at the top of his game: 10 or 15 cars rounding that corner, the drivers opening their windows to return his wave, then honking their horn; Willie, with a smile of concentration, returning these greetings with both hands moving at warp speed, committed to the task that none shall drive away waveless from His corner.

I think, however, it is deeper.

My brother, Lucky, once told me a story:  a medieval architect interviewed three workers on his jobsite.  He asked what they were doing.  The first man said ‘I am laying bricks.’  The second man said ‘I am building a wall.’  The third man said ‘I am helping to build a great cathedral dedicated to the Lord God of all creation.’  All three men were doing the same job.

It is the perspective that ennobles the work.

Willie has selected this job and he pursues his waving without being paid.  He comes to it with happy anticipation and stays there with enthusiastic loyalty. Tiger could no doubt beat him in golf, Lebron in basketball.  No one, however, can ‘outgreet’ Willie.

Willie has raised and dignified this endeavor with his commitment.  I have seen people come to their jobs with apathy, essentially reducing the nobility of their work by their lack of passion.  I wish one could bottle whatever it is that Willie has and the majority of us lack.  Just a fraction of such enthusiastic loyalty would do wonders for the workplace, the marriage, and the childrearing of most of us.

Whether it is hobby or habit with Willie, it rises to the level of an anointing.  He could have chosen a solitary pursuit, such as stamp collecting or video games.  Instead, Willie has chosen a relational interaction with his fellow humans.  He risks being ignored or taunted, sunburned or frost bitten.  Nothing deters him.

Perhaps some of you know Willie and feel an even stronger bond with him.  For me, his greeting is a bit of a benediction.  Those are my mornings of ‘God is in His heaven, Willie is at his corner, and all is well with the world.’  Willie’s wave is his imprimatur upon my day.  God Bless you, Willie.  See you tomorrow, buddy.

– Dennis Garvin

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