52 Cups of Coffee: Inspiring and insightful stories for navigating life’s uncertainties (14 page)

Jim Little

H&H Mobil in East Lansing, Michigan

Medium brewed coffee, hazelnut blend

I
t’s nice to have a place where everybody knows your name.

The epic “
Snowpocalypse” snowstorm of 2011 descended upon East Lansing, closing down schools and interrupting my original plans to head to Detroit for Cup 26 in the process.

Unsure of how to carry out the week
’s coffee plan, I looked at the 11 inches of snow, through which I would have to trudge and remembered hearing a story about how Jim Little, the owner of H&H Mobil, had once voluntarily plowed my friend’s driveway after a last major snowfall. Included in my friend’s story was helpful advice: “You’re a business major—if you want to know about customer service, he’s the guy to talk to!”

So I
decided to call up H&H and ask for Jim. I apologized for the late notice and asked if he’d be willing to meet for coffee the next day. He said he’s at the shop from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily, so he’d be around if I stopped by. I said I’d see him at 10:30

While coffee shops have the ambiance and magnetic po
wer of caffeine that draws me in on a daily basis, gas stations are places I only frequent when my gas warning light yells at me. I find them dingy, unwelcoming, and overly fluorescent. When I do get a fill-up, I typically pay at the pump and quickly go on my way.

Nevertheless,
the idea of sharing a cup of coffee outside my usual realm is was intriguing. As I drove to the store, I hoped my intuition didn’t let me down.

I walked into the station
to find Jim talking with two customers. He said hello and I introduced myself before he pointed me toward the coffee and told me to help myself. With a coffee in hand, we found a spot in an unoccupied corner of the store—between the bathroom and the pop machine—where he asked me outright, “Well, what do you want to know?”

* * *

Jim, like me, had studied business at Michigan State. After graduation, he had set his sights on going back into the Navy as a pilot, but the uncertainty of the Vietnam War had prompted him to put his business degree to work instead. He’d heard about the opportunity to buy a new Mobil Oil station on the corner of Hagadorn and Haslett roads, and decided to venture into entrepreneurship. He had previous experience working in gas stations and figured it would be a good undertaking for a couple of years. He bought the shop, and named it Hagadorn and Haslett Mobil (quickly shortened to H&H); 41 years later, he was still running the business.

Jim
is in his late 60s and works in the store about 12 hours a day, five days a week, plus a handful of hours on the weekend. He told me his wife can’t figure out where he gets all his energy.

For my part, I can’t figure out how anyone could look so happy with a work schedule like his.
However, the longer I am in the store, the more it made sense. When I asked him if, after 40 years in business, his customers felt like family, he gave a knowing chuckle and motioned me to follow him to where two customers were standing by the candy bars, shooting the breeze while their cars were being serviced. He interrupted them, “Guys, would you say I know most of my customers?” The hearty response from the man, later introduced as Chuck, said it all: “Oh yeah! This is a neighborhood store; everyone I know comes here.” The other man, amusingly also named Chuck, agreed. They’d clearly been loyal customers for years.

Jim and I walk
ed back to the corner to continue our conversation, which was interrupted moments later as the general conversation in the shop shifted to the impending boat season. Jim wanted to contribute his two cents, and then the talk somehow moved to flying. Jim mentioned he liked to fly his plane to various vacation spots; the woman behind the counter chimed in that while it was a fun plane to fly, landing it was another story.

I soon realized the woman behind the counter was Jim’s wife.
They had met long ago when she started working at the station. And that’s when I figured out Jim worked so much while staying happy: H&H was more than just his job and his business; it was his social life, his family, and where he felt most at home. After just 20 minutes, the camaraderie in the shop had won me over.

I
was quietly observing the proceedings—taking note of how it oddly felt like I was as in the middle of a sitcom—when suddenly an employee behind the counter answered a call. There was a car stuck on the train tracks. With the three other towing guys out on calls, it was Jim’s job to go get it moved. With the agility of a man half his age, Jim sprung into action. He rushed out of the shop to check on something, and then ran back in, calling through the open door, “You want to come? You can see how I spend my days!”

I sprinted out of the store caught completely off-guard by the drastic change of events. I tossed my coffee into
one of the bins by the pump, as I watched Jim quickly look both ways before rushing across the busy street. He then held back traffic so I could follow him across to the impound lot.

We jumped into his truck and
were on our way out of the lot, when an update came through the radio. The car—luckily—was no longer stuck.

W
e parked the truck and walked back to the station. My heartbeat slowly returned to normal, along with the conversation. I asked Jim what he had learned after 40 years in business. He replied, “Work hard, stay healthy, and have good luck.” It was basic advice, but it was advice that had been good to Jim.

His business model
was just as simple. His secret to success was to be there when people dropped their cars off in the morning and to be there when they picked them up at night. He always said thank you, treated his customers right, and did his best to offer a quality product. He didn’t advertise; he didn’t need to.

Our conversation
ended when an older man, probably somewhere in his 80s, walked in and said hello. He’d brought his car in for service. Jim told him to grab a coffee; he’d give him a ride home in a second. Cleary this wasn’t the first time Jim had given him a ride, and I was sure he’d go back to pick him up once his car was finished.

* * *

As I walked back to my car, I reflected on the experience with satisfaction that it had, in fact, been as chaotic and interesting as I’d hoped. However, it wasn’t until later that day when the disjointed events at H&H made sense.

I decide
d to take my neglected, winter-worn car for a much-needed oil change. I could have had H&H do it, but old habits die hard and, without a second thought, I headed down the road to the franchise service shop I’d visited at least a dozen times. Despite my many trips, when I walked inside, the service man asked if I had ever been there before.

It
happened every time. And never has anyone there remembered my name, offered me a ride, or asked about my family. They knew me as a 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee, not as Megan, the loyal customer. I instantly regretted not going back to H&H.

* * *

As the characters in
Cheers
know, it’s nice to have a place where everybody (or at least somebody) knows your name—especially in today’s increasingly technological world with self-checkout, pay-at-the-pump, online banking, online shopping, email, and more. Life is faster than ever, but it can also be isolating.

Jim
’s story shows the power of going out of your way to make a connection with someone—to say hello, to listen, to offer a cup of coffee.

I know I
’ll be back to H&H. Because when life is going a hundred miles an hour and getting gas is the last thing I want to do, it would be nice to hear someone say, “Thanks for stopping in, Megan, and have a great day.”

Masaki Takahashi

Wanderer’s Teahouse in East Lansing, Michigan

Small green tea

Forgiveness is hard, but better than a lifetime of resentment.

Cup 27 started with an unexpected
email. The student-run newspaper at Michigan State had printed a story about my 52 Cups project, and Masaki Takahashi, who just happened to stumble across it, felt compelled to email me.

The last
line of his email hooked me: “I love the idea of the blog because I am on my own mission to branch out as well. I have kept this guard up from letting people into my life and am hoping to let it down.”

Th
e message resonated with me—big time. One of the greatest things that had happened to me during college has been learning to let my walls down. I came into college as a reserved freshman, but because I was a thousand miles from home, I had to eventually open up to the people around me. Luckily, I made incredible supportive friends and learned that the more I open up, the better life gets.

I decided I had to meet him.

* * *

When I walked into the teashop, I found him waiting at the counter. I introduced myself, and we ordered tea (which, although a deviation from my coffee-norm, I allowed due to our location), and found a place to sit down. The teashop was crowded but had a comfortable atmosphere conducive to good conversation. After a few minutes of small talk, I asked him to tell me a little bit about himself.

It took him three sentences to answer my
question, “Well, I’m a Media Arts major. I’m a junior. I have a four-year-old son; that’s about it.”

Two things about his response caught me off-guard. First of all, I
would never have guessed this young 20-something student would have a son. And secondly, he was so nonchalant with his answer: Three sentences and a “that’s about it”? I knew there had to be more.

In his defense, he had told me he was good at keeping his walls
up. Luckily, as I continued to ask him questions, he opened up and his incredible story eventually came out.

* * *

Masaki’s high-school sweetheart had gotten pregnant during their freshman year of college. It was an unexpected event and a scary time for both of them, but they married, and Masaki shifted his focus to doing everything necessary to take care of his new family. They needed money, so he started working 80 hours a week, eventually dropping out of school because he couldn’t juggle a family, job, and classes.

While the constant work kept food on the table, it took a toll on his new marriage. He thought he was doing the right thing—providing financial support—but keeping
the family together took more than just money. The strain of the situation eventually became too much, and Masaki and his wife decided to split up.

As he told me this, it was evident he was disappointed—both because he had lost someone he truly loved, and because he felt like he
’d let his family and himself down. In the process of this story, he explained, “I think I failed because I had never seen it done right.”

It wasn
’t an excuse, nor was he passing the blame to someone else. He was simply stating a fact: he had grown up in a rocky household and didn’t know what a stable family looked like; let alone how to create one.

* * *

Masaki was born in Japan and had never known his father. At the age of four, his mother, overwhelmed with single-motherhood, had sent him to live with his aunt and uncle in America.

The transition from life in Japan to life in America—without his mom by his side—had been inevitably difficult. And while the situation was better than life in Japan, it wasn
’t ideal. His uncle struggled with alcohol, and his new home lacked praise and encouragement.

By age 16, Masaki had developed some behavioral pro
blems (in his words, he was a ‘brat’), and his aunt and uncle weren’t equipped to deal with these problems. They kicked him out of the house, sending him back to Japan to live with his mom.

So once again, he was shuffled across the world to a new environment. After being away for ten years—not to mention
that adolescence was already a difficult period in one’s life—reconnecting with his mom was an interesting experience. Overall, he enjoyed the experience and the freedom he had to explore the city, before eventually returning to his aunt and uncle’s home in the U.S., graduating from high school and then enrolling at Michigan State.

Had I known his history in advance, I probably would have been expecting to meet a resentful, overwhelmed man
. Let alone a man juggling split-custody of a four-year-old (“the coolest kid in the world”), a full course load and two jobs. That’s a lot for one man to handle.

But
Masaki’s disposition showed no trace of a stressful life. He is enthusiastic, gracious, and has a great outlook on life. I asked him how he did it—how he kept going when life got so hard. How he stayed on the right path when, without anyone supporting him, he could have so easily gone down a much darker path?

His answers gave true insight into his character. He said he felt like he had something to prove to the world—and I could see the drive in his eyes. One day, he said he wanted to look back at the years of struggl
ing and see that all his pain had been worth it. He was driven by the idea that a better life awaited him and his son, and if he could endure long enough, he would find it.

But
, in the meantime, he persists and holds onto his optimism. As he said, “As long as there’s a tomorrow, life is all right.”

* * *

As I talked with Masaki, I kept thinking about a quote I’d heard once:
Life is not holding a good hand; Life is playing a poor hand well.

If I
’d learned anything in my first six months of coffees, it’s that nobody is dealt a perfect hand; we all have a unique set of challenges. Seeing Masaki’s unwavering drive for a better life, despite his struggles, was an inspiration.

Masaki
has many people in his past he could understandably be angry with, but a major lesson he’d learned is that harboring pain and anger only makes you bitter. Instead of holding onto the resentment of his childhood, he was looking for the strength to forgive and move on.

Resentment
is something that builds up easily—whether from a major incident or small ones gradually accumulating over time. As it builds, it starts to weigh us down, hindering us from moving forward.

It
can happen unconsciously, which is why I appreciated my conversation with Masaki. It prompted me to think about my own burdens, the hatchets I had been meaning to bury.

Masaki invited me to coffee as a way to let his walls down, and in the process
, he showed me that there were some I was still holding up.