Roger & me

I started working for Roger & the chapel part time in January of 2009. They had been sans bookkeeper for a month or two, so I had a lot of catching up to do. And coincidently, it was right at the time that I had to study for the series 7 &66, so I was a little overwhelmed. I think this was really when I started to kick myself into overdrive. To be truthful, it was a welcome escape. I had a silent office to go to after the noisy job, I had a place where people respected me and valued the work I was doing and I got to learn something new. It was often intimidating, having to learn an entirely new system with no one to teach me. I was in the chapel when I said goodbye to my grandma over the phone and I was at the chapel when our house was burglarized. Went there when we didn't have a place to go for Easter and spent many evenings over the last 18 months staring at giant portraits of Roger baptizing babies and marrying people.

The chapel has a variety of missions, to uplift Westport, to help plan neighborhood events for children, to plan weddings and baptisms and funerals for people. This year, they also had a memorial service for the unsolved murders and disappearances of people through out the last years in Kansas City. There are photos of people praying around an open grave and lighting candles for those who have been lost in the city to violence. I've really grown to respect the work they do & I feel lucky that I am somehow on the peripheries of people who work quietly and with dignity towards a peaceful purpose.

Sometimes I'll be at work there alone and a stranger will drop by and ask for money, something Roger will freely give if it's evident they're in need. Sometimes people will stop by and ask to go in the Chapel, since they were married there 15 years ago and just stopped by for a quick visit from out of town. I try to oblige them and in the process, I have, too, fallen in love with the location. This year, they are building a peace garden in the back and this year, I was going to be the Easter bunny. I am still tempted to come back and try it.

A few months ago, I was in the office for a moment looking for a file and saw something that made my jaw drop. I didn't believe it, it didn't make sense, it was strange and unusual. But I couldn't ask about it, it wasn't my place, it was an accident that I saw it, so I remained silent and wondered about it over the last few months.

But since I am leaving and since I was saying my final goodbyes, and since it was a quiet day then, I quietly brought up what I had found, prefacing it by saying that it wasn't my business, but I couldn't help but ask.

I had found an envelope indicating my boss was taking care of some business for a serial killer that lived nearby in the 80s. He has been caught and tried and jailed and died in the last 20 odd years. The story that unfolded was surprising, and he started it by saying "I had just come back from Ethiopia, and when I returned, I thought I could do anything...." He told me the story about hiding from the media frenzy, about visiting the prison, about the remorse and then downfall of the perp. It went on for 18 months, and he was there to pick up the pieces. He lost 20 pounds, he had phone calls from jail directly to his house. On and on and on it went, until the end. I sat in silence, trying to comprehend, and it was amazing. "I thought I could do anything, then I realized I was wrong...."

At the end of my tenure here, I mentioned having to move myself, since Dan was in MN already, and I had to pack up the mess. 2 days later, ROger messaged to let me know that instead of paying the maintenance employee to tend the chapel and garden that day, he would pay for him to help me load the moving van. It is sincerely one of the most gracious acts I've received. I hope everyone else can find some place as spiritual as this, for we all seek redemption in some way in our lives.