On Not Judging Books By Their Covers

Ron is the usual usher at our church on Sunday mornings.  He's warm and grandfatherly: the kind of usher who lets all the kids, even the little ones, help bring up the gifts during the service.  (He rubber-bands the lids on the wine and bread vessels closed so that they can't accidentally open in transit up the aisle, to the great relief of all the parents.)  He has a grandson with issues similar to Thing Two's, and has never hesitated to put my son right in there with all the other kids, even back in the days when he was acting up a lot more than he is now.  An ex-Marine pilot, he often wears golf shirts from tournaments supporting military charities or a US flag pin to services.

I learned this past weekend that Ron grew up playing soccer, and that a soccer scholarship was his ticket to college.  His dad drove a bus in the Bronx--there was just no extra money for anything beyond the basics.  This actually reminded me a lot of my father-in-law's story: his dad died young, and his mom worked as a cleaning lady and cook to support the family after he died.  With five kids, her salary didn't go too far.  Of those five, my father-in-law is the only one with a college education, and that only happened because he earned a track scholarship.  His four siblings all went into the Army straight out of high school.

Anyway, the reason Ron's story took me a little aback is that he's clearly very well-to-do now.  Drives a nice car, owns car dealerships or something, lives on a big, beautiful horse farm.  Not somebody I would have pictured growing up poor in the Bronx, if I'd ever stopped to think about it.  Clearly, he pulled himself up a long way, with some help from soccer and the Marines.

Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.  That's the best part of the story.