Another prime example of generosity paying off is my relationship with the men from the water company. Our work often overlapped. Sometimes when we dug a hole for a gas leak we found a water leak, also. And vice verse. We often traded favors, not even trying to keep track of the things we did or received.

One time they had a really unusual job. They seemed to be perplexed, so I went over to see what their trouble might be. I looked at the victim, and suggested that we try to thread the pipe. It was not a simple case. The thread needed to be cut on the end of the pipe with no room for the conventional die which had a sleeve to ensure that the die would "take" properly. I heard one of the crew say: "That old man is crazy!"

But I wasn't. There is a way of taking the cutting part of the dies out and reversing them so that the thread was cut from the open side of the dies. I showed them, and it worked.

Sometime later we were working high pressure on Broadway. The background for this was that I had tried to get our company to stock clamps for three quarter pipe with no positive results. The answer I got was that if a pipe that size leaked, it needed to be renewed. This was undisputed fact, but sometimes....

So.This was the day.

Chub was digging out the tap hole, and a big chunk of hard dirt came loose along with a big chunk of three-quarter inch pipe.The hard dirt was caused be leaking gas. The obvious thing to do was to tell the customer that we would have to shut off their gas and repair the pipe temporarily until we could renew it.

It turned out that the customer was a potato chip factory. They said if we shut off their gas, it would spoil the whole batch of material they were cooking. They estimated the cost at seven hundred dollars. I was between a rock and a hard place!

As I was trying to figure out an answer to this seemingly impossible problem I caught sight of a water company truck a block down the street. I told the men to just keep everybody away from the hole and I took out on a run for the water company truck, I knew they used three quarter-inch clamps. I just hoped that this truck would have one.

It turned out to be Curt Bridgman, an old timer that I had worked with many times. I used what breath I had to say: "Give me a three quarter inch clamp!"

Curt reached in his bin and came out with a three-quarter inch clamp. I took it back and installed it.

My case was made.The management ordered three-quarter inch clamps, and we used several bushels of them in the following years.

*** *** ***

Another interesting experience was my negotiating for the purchase of a hay wagon from Harold Schulte. He had been putting up the hay from our field for several years. So he decided to retire from that chore. Since he no longer needed the wagon and I did, I undertook to buy it from him.

I offered him fifty dollars for it. He said he had planned to ask me twenty-five. So we settled for thirty seven fifty. [Janet: An example of "reverse bargaining!]

I still have the vehicle. We have re-enforced it several places, but it has stood the test of time and use. Solid as the man I bought it from.

*** *** ***

I had a good relationship with my foreman at the gas company. Dewey Payne trusted me to do what needed doing. Sometimes it did not fall completely within the scope of our specifications, but getting the customer back working was really the basic aim. Sometimes there was a conflict with strict regulations.

One day Dewey said to me: "Erwin, there is a big mess with the pipes, down at Mama Mia's Pizza Place. Go down there and fix it!"

So I did. It was not in accordance with a new rule that had just come out, but it followed the practice that we had been following for the last thirty years. When we got done the proprietress made us the best pizza that I have ever had--on the house!

One day my helper, Cal Lebegue, needed to go downtown during business hours and sign some papers. I happened to be in the foreman's office when he asked Dewey for the time off.

If I hadn't known the man, I would have thought that he was mad, but he wasn't. He looked at Cal.

"You're on a truck, aren't you?" Cal, thoroughly confused, agreed that he was. "I don't even want to know about it!" Dewey told him.

*** *** ***

I never heard Dewey laugh in the years that I knew him, but I clearly remember seeing him smile, twice.

He was the foreman, "the boss." I was the union steward. Traditionally, this was a contentious relationship. Or, the other way it worked sometimes, the steward was wanting to be agreeable so that he might get some personal advantage. But if he had a problem with a man he would talk to me about it, and we would find a workable solution.

One evening, he said he had a problem, so I waited until the other fitters had their business of the day completed and prepared to listen. He said he had this man that none of the features wanted to have on their crew. I'd had the man on my crew before, and never had any trouble. The solution seemed simple to me. So I said: "Give him to me. I never had any trouble with him."

I thought for a moment that Dewey might laugh, but he smiled--one of the two smiles that I remember.

"What do you think you've got now, but two men that nobody else wants to work?"

Well, it had been awhile since either of my two men had worked for another fitter. We picked the one that we thought would be the most likely to succeed and made the trade. It worked.

The other time I saw Dewey smile was the case of a service man who did not want to work the after hour call-outs. Usually this was work that the men fought over, because it paid good money. But for some reason Clarence did not want to work them. This was his right, but the contract stated that he had to be asked, and turn the assignment down before the foreman could go on and ask the next man in line. Well, getting called up at midnight simply to fulfill the contract requirements was almost as bad as working the call-out. But Dewey was caught with the requirements of the contract, which he faithfully tried to follow. What to do? Clarence was quite outspoken about not wanting to be disturbed.

I told Dewey the story of the Christmas Eve Mouse. The household consisted of three people: the father, mother, and grown daughter. Following the custom of many people, they celebrated Christmas Eve with a bit of alcoholic cheer. The three glasses were left on the table.

Enter the Christmas Eve Mouse.

He sampled the leavings on the first glass. He smiled, smacked his lips and tried the second one. He frowned, looked around, and then tried the third one.From this one he straightened up, looked around angrily, and demanded: "Where is that cat!"

Dewey got the point. This was the one place where Clarence could make himself heard, and he was doing it.

The solution that we arrived at was that he signed a letter stating his position of not wanting to work overtime and relieved the management of the obligation of notifying him when the opportunity presented itself. This worked to the satisfaction of all concerned.

*** *** ***

I'm ninety-five years old. I've had a lot of fun, met some really great people, done some good turns, and have been the receiver of many helpful hands. Of course there are those who simply take. But really, they are in the minority. Not just for the practical results, but for the satisfaction I get out of it personally, I have found that "It pays to be generous."

*** *** ***

Sometimes it pays to be generous. (And as a personal reward, it is a pleasant way to live)

I have often seemed to be in a position of being where something that I could do would help some of my fellow humans.

The Good Book advises us to cast our bread upon the waters and it shall be returned to us. Not exactly a practical suggestion, but applying it to the opportunities that we are offered in our lives it is a very comfortable philosophy. And in many cases, it has actually been a practical one for me.

As we worked, doing our job for the gas company, we were often confronted with situations which could either be funny or aggravating, whichever way a person might choose to view them.

One shining example of this circumstance was the Bland Brothers. Sewer contractors were a fact of life to us at the gas company. They came and went. Some were careful and courteous, finding out where our lines and the water lines were located before they started. Others were very self centered, digging where they needed to dig to install their sewer and pretending that there was nothing in that particular area of earth to interfere. Our gas lines suffered.

Enter the Bland Brothers, fresh from Calhoun County. They were pleasant people, with their minds strictly on their job at hand. They tore up three gas service lines, the first day. Just the way that our work unraveled, I inherited the job of repairing all three of them.

Which I did. I tried to educate them about the hazards of city excavations. As it was, the damage simply amounted to repairing or replacing the damaged lines. The possibilities existed, however, of serious injury, massive property damage, or even death with some bad luck and/or bad handling.

I tried to really educate them to the different conditions from the ones that they were used to. It could have been a contentious situation, depending on the personalities of the people involved.

Fortunately we were able to communicate in a civilized manner, and it worked. I guess I was a good teacher, and certainly they were good students. They got the "feel" of putting their installations in between the existing lines without damaging those already in use.

This would have been good results and pay for the time, energy and patience I had given them, but the real pay off of their feelings came to light one totally miserable, rainy, cold day.

The background: Earlier that year, the sewer contractor had installed a sewer in a very wet area. To ensure the safety of the tile crew they had dug the ditch about three times as wide at the top. This was good for them, but surely bad for the gas lines.

The obvious, predictable result was that when the dirt settled, it took the gas lines along with it. Logically, this had to happen when it rained or snowed.

On a cold, miserable winter day, with rain falling enough to make things thoroughly miserable, we got a leak call for that area. Knowing the area, we almost knew what was the trouble. But not a simple case, necessarily. Could be the service line pulled out of the compression coupling at the tap, or broken at a coupling out under the street .

My foreman asked if I wanted a backhoe. I declined, as at that time our backhoes did not have a closed cab. The operator would have been thoroughly miserable by the time they got to the job, let alone whatever it took to actually find the leak and do the digging work. So. Just as we pulled up at where we figured the trouble was, here comes one of the Bland Boys with his backhoe. He was laughing.

"Where do you want the hole dug?" he asked me. Pay day.

See Part 2: "Sometimes it pays to be generous," tomorrow on Riehlife under our "Family Matters" category.

I do not have an accounting of the building of the church, but this story has been apart of the Riehl heritage all of my lifetime.

My maternal Grandfather E. A. Riehl was not a church going man. Do not confuse this as saying that he was not a religious man.

1) He believed in a Divine Presence, and communed with his God through the love and prorogation of God's plants and fruits.

2) He also ministers to human problems.

--- He "figured out" the ingredients of a salve that he gave freely to the neighbors who had need of ointment and they had no money for doctor's ministration.

---He made coffins in his shop for those who could not afford the "store-bought" ones.

The only reference I found in his day books was that he had gone to a church meeting and had not been inspired by the sermon. This, the background. His opinions and thoughts on this subject were well known.

Yet, he was actively helping to build the Melville Congregational Church.

One day, and one of the other neighbor volunteers asked him:"Mister Riehl, why are you helping build this church? It is well known that you are not a church going man."

His reply went something like this: "I commune with my God through my work with God's creations like the plants and flowers. But a community needs a church for the people who need the formality of worshiping together, and the other things like funerals and weddings. I believe that a community needs a church. I am helping to build it."

Remember that in that day there were no funeral parlors to take care of funeral services. Weddings were performed in a church, or in the parsonage.

"Hospitality and generosity are the true calling cards of the Middle East." --Naomi Shihab Nye
Missouri Writers Guild Conference Luncheon, April 12, 2008

Also see:

Does the Land Remember Me? (A Memoir of Palestine) by Aziz Shihab (her father)

Tasting the Sky by Ibtisam Barakat

RED BROCADE

–From 19 Varieties of Gazelle
by Naomi Shihab Nye

The Arabs used to say,
When a stranger appears at your door,
feed him for three days
before asking who he is,
where he's come from,
where he's headed.
That way, he'll have strength
enough to answer.
Or, by then you'll be
such good friends
you don't care.

Let's go back to that.
Rice? Pine Nuts?
Here, take the red brocade pillow.
My child will serve water
to your horse.

No, I was not busy when you came!
I was not preparing to be busy.
That's the armor everyone put on
to pretend they had a purpose
in the world.

I refuse to be claimed.
Your plate is waiting.
We will snip fresh mint
into your tea.

Click here to hear Richard Benjamin reciting Naomi Shihab Nye's "Red Brocade" on You Tube.

Copyright 2002 by Naomi Shihah Nye. Used with permission.

As it turns out, Daniel ordered one dozen roses and Fortune multiplied his order by two.

The arithmetic problem: 1 dozen x (Lady Fortune) 2 = 2 dozen roses received/1 dozen paid for.

This is a good thing, for Daniel is a gardener. How fitting for this hard-working gardener to have his hard-wording dollars multiplied by 2 for his Order of the Roses. And, what a note of confidence, that he told me as much and we had a mutual chuckle.

Now, these two dozen roses Fortune brought to my door, went out of my door as follows [Imagine rose petals for each offering on the list]:

** When Obinna Nwakanma came to my Gathering Room for an afternoon of talk that set the world right, we exchanged poetry books, and I sent a small bouquet of Daniel's roses home to his wife.

** I left a half-dozen roses in my niece's refrigerator at the White Cottage to welcome their family home from their journey of re-building in the Louisiana storm zone.

**I enjoyed the roses in my bedroom at my father's home and then gave that half-dozen to my Cousin Cynthia and her daughter Elizabeth.

** I prolonged the life of the roses in my refrigerator. I shared the images of the roses with readers on Riehlife. [Another arithmetic problem arises....how many petals for how many roses X 500 readers per day = x] I called Daniel with frequent Rose Reports to tell him about the continuing life of the roses as they extended further into the world over the course of three weeks.

**I dried the petals and the life of the roses took more journeys, multiplying even further:

--When N. came for her art date and I showed her papercutting, as mother had showed me, we assembled eight packets for each member of her family that contains a colored snowflake, a handfolded paper cup, and a few of Daniel's hardworking rose petals.

--I placed dried rose petals in one of mother's best sky-blue glass dishes and then placed these inside Julia's grave...the dried petals mixing with the clods of frozen earth.

--I sent more dried petals inside notes to my two great-nieces and my niece after Julia's burial on March 8th.

And, now, finally, the roses have completed their journey out into the world from Daniel's heart, through my hand...and we extend their petals, beauty, and healing power in an offering of abundance and generosity...(dedicated to Oshun, Nigerian goddess of love and beauty).

It's all due to you, Dame Fortune...that's one heck of an arithmetic problem!

Sure enough, there they were...little prints of shrimps, California rolls, and other delicacies...bright colors on the black canvas of my socks...complete with chopsticks to pick them up and put them into your mouth...although, of course, I always use my fingers.

And all this time, I'd thought these little pictures were flowers, not clever popular culture statements.

I'd never really seen them before. My socks are hipper than I am.