Ray

Ray, a great guy and amazing asset to the Bryn Mawr Athletics Program, passed away last Friday. I went to two memorial services today for Ray, and learned a lot about him that I didn't know. From his physical appearance, I assumed he was an athlete at some point in his life. He was extremely tall and muscular, at least 6'3 and 250 pounds. During high school he was the star of both the baseball and basketball teams, and was offered a contract with the Chicago Cubs as well as a full scholarship to Temple University for basketball. He ultimately chose basketball at Temple, which is lucky for Bryn Mawr, because he probably wouldn't have ended up there had he gone to Chicago. Ray was a giant compared to most people on Bryn Mawr's campus, but he was a gentle giant. He was soft-spoken and always had something encouraging to say. He never missed a home event at Bryn Mawr. He was always there, standing stoically on the sidelines of every soccer game I played. I always saw him on the field, checking things out as I walked to the gym an hour and a half before games started. His greeting to every person he saw was "Hey, Bud."

One of the two services today was a Quaker Meeting style memorial service, where people stood up and told their stories of Ray. One girl talked about how much she didn't like being at Bryn Mawr because she was homesick all the time. She talked about how eventually, through playing field hockey, and lifting weights under the guidance of Ray in the off season, the gym became the place where she felt most at home on the Bryn Mawr campus. It wasn't the dorms or her major department. It was the gym, with Ray and all the coaches. I never thought about it before, but that is exactly how I felt at Bryn Mawr, and how I still feel. I've walked into the gym a handful of times since graduating, and I always feel at ease there. I know I'll see familiar friendly faces, and I know I will really miss Ray's being one of them.

Ray dedicated the later part of his life to making people, especially women at Bryn Mawr, physically stronger. He pushed our bodies to the limits, but not beyond what he knew we could do. He cared so immensely about each person in that gym or on those fields, that it's almost hard to believe. He had to undergo a double knee replacement a couple of months ago, and complications from that kept him without the use of his legs for longer than he or anyone else expected. The complications meant was no longer able to do the one thing he seemingly loved most in life, which was being a part of Bryn Mawr Athletics. Unfortunately, this frustration turned into depression, which ultimately led Ray to decide life wasn't worth living anymore.

I wish Ray could have known how much he meant to all of us. I wish there was something we could have done, an extra step we could have taken. I will always remember him as that big friendly giant in the gym and on the soccer field, with a huge smile and a "Hey Bud!". He will hold a place in all hearts who had the honor of knowing him.

Strange Happenings

So the other day I was walking down the street to a beer store (yes, in Pennsylvania you can only buy beer at designated stores). This store is only two blocks from my apartment, but I saw two significantly strange things on my walk.

The first was a tiny little snake wriggling down the sidewalk. It couldn't have been more than a couple inches long, and at first I thought it was a garter snake, but I am pretty sure those are black. I might be wrong. This snake was tan or light yellow (it was pretty dark outside). I tried to guide it to the side of the sidewalk where there was grass in hopes that it wouldn't get stepped on, but I don't know if it made it. Hopefully he/she is out there somewhere, and doesn't grow much bigger.

The second thing I saw was a trolley hit a car. I was standing on the corner, waiting for Jess to pick me up on her way back from work so we could go to a friend's house, when I heard a loud bang/crunch. I looked over and the trolley was stopped, and as I crossed the street to the other side, I realized there was a car smashed up against the trolley. I guess the car was pulling out of a spot on the side of the street and the trolley crashed into it. I am not sure whose fault it was, but neither vehicle could have been going more than 10 miles per hour. The driver's door though, was completely stuck closed though, because it was up against the side of the trolley. No one was seriously injured. I felt bad for everyone riding on the trolley though because they all had to get off, and no other trolley was going to be coming anytime soon because the tracks were now blocked off with this accident. Bummer.

That is all I have to report from the block at 48th and Chester. More to come.

the commercial lies

You may remember a commercial, probably for visa, where everyone is in a cafeteria line and there's music playing in rhythm with each customer paying for their meal with their debit card. Then one person pulls out cash and the music comes to a screeching halt, and the person is bascially shunned because they ruined the fast paced rhythm of the check-out line.

I think of this commercial all the time when I am working at the cafe because it is actually the exact opposite. When I have a line out the door and am working at the register, I hate to see someone pull our their credit card. This means sliding the card, waiting for the receipts to print, giving them the receipt to sign, waiting for them to decide if they're going to tip me or not, signing it, them handing it back and waiting for the register to finalize the transaction. All this in the time I could have had 3 customers pay with cash and move on. Also if the card is old and the machine won't read the strip, I have to type in the card number manually.

So. If you have the cash, I say use it. Don't be fooled by that commercial. It's for people who want to make themselves feel better for holding up lines with their credit cards.

The little visitor

Today at work I was in the middle of a transaction at the cash register and I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I looked to my left, and scurrying across the floor was a tiny brown mouse. I was holing the money the woman getting coffee across the register from me had just given me but in the midst of trying not to freak out about the mouse, I totally lost concentration of what I was doing. I used all the focus I had to get her the right change and have her leave the counter. When my flamboyantly gay (and awesome) shift leader came back from wherever he was I let him know about our little visitor. He said he would call the owner and let him know.

A few minutes later we were helping more customers when I hear my shift leader say "Oh my god" under his breath. I looked over and the mouse was right at the edge of where behind the counter becomes the public seating area...just teetering on the edge of remaining a secret and becoming a public health code violation. I tried to keep a straight face as we worked through the line of customers. Then the little guy crawled under the refrigerated case where we keep soda, juice, water etc. Another girl who was working took the top of a plastic "clamshell" salad to-go container to try and trap the mouse when he came out from his hiding spot and I got the broom and dustpan in case he came my way. Needless to say, he really liked that spot and stayed there for a while.

Later in the night, my shift leader and I were standing at the espresso/sandwich end of the bar (farthest away from the soda/water/juice cooler) and the mouse came crawling back towards us, distracted by all the little bits of food on the ground. My shift leader and I both froze, knowing we had to trap him (or her) but not knowing how. I said "quick! give me something to put over it!" and the first thing he handed me was a big metal salad-tossing bowl, which i promptly covered the mouse with. My shift leader then ran to the back and got a much-too-large-for-a-mouse sized box. We slid the box under the bowl until the little mouse's tail was sticking out from the bowl, which was mostly in the box. then I pulled out the bowl with salad-tossing tongs and closed the box, and carried it outside to the dumpter. I could feel him scurrying around inside the box as I carried it, but then when I put it in the dumpster and opened it, he just sat there in the corner of the box. He was so tiny (smaller than a golf ball) and his heart was beating so fast, he must have been terrified. I left him in the box (hoping he'd find some good stuff to eat in the dumpster), and bid him farewell.

Mouse problem solved. For now.


Another highlight of the day included a man coming in as we were closing and asking for a scone. We told him we were closed, and he said, "I really need it, It's my birthday you can keep the change," and handed us ten dollars and walked out the door. My shift leader gave himself and me $5 each and let him have the scone "for free".

In other, more serious news, someone at the store got their purse stolen tonight. It's the third time it's happened there since I started working and the 5th time it's happened in the last month or so. Apparently it's some woman who comes in and just looks around or sits down for a while and then walks out and grabs things on the way. No good at all.

That's all for my adventures in coffee-land today. Mr (or Ms.) mouse definitely stole the show!

It's always (almost never) sunny in Philadelphia!

So I recently moved to Philadelphia, into a one bedroom apartment with my girlfriend. We live on a quiet street in West Philly in an old Victorian that has been converted into apartments. I was starting to feel pretty hopeless about getting a job, and then all of the sudden, I landed two in one day. I am working at a cafe in Rittenhouse Sq. during the morning/early afternoon and then rushing off to Drexel Hill to coach soccer at a Catholic School there. During the end of September and the month of October I am mostly working twelve-hour days between the two jobs, but so far both are going well. I am the head coach of the "jjv" team which consists of 3rd and 4th graders-mostly boys. I am the assistant/goalie coach for jv (5th and 6th grade) and varsity (7th and 8th grade). I am also volunteer-coaching a 7 and 8 year old soccer team on Saturday mornings at Clark Park, near my apartment.

I wanted to start keeping a blog again because I see and hear so many funny and interesting things every day. Here are some from the past week or two that have been memorable.

1) I was sitting on the trolley home from work when a very young looking girl got on with her infant daughter. The baby was sleeping, so she draped her over her knees and opened up a binder on the babies back to do some studying. I looked over her shoulder and the reading material was on emergency contraception.

2) On my first day of coaching Clark Park soccer (7 and 8 year olds) we were scrimmaging at the end of practice. I had a little boy named Dayvon playing defense. I said "Dayvon, are you excited" and he said "yes." I said "I think our team is gonna win, I can feel it!" He paused for a second and said "I can feel it too." Then he paused for another minute and looked up at me and said "Ya'll got bats?" I said "no...do you mean like baseball bats?" to which he replied a simple and innocent "yeah". I said "You want to use a baseball bat to play defense?", and he looked up at me and said "yeah" like it was the most casual thing in the world. I tried not to laugh as a explained to him that we can't use bats in soccer.

3) I was on the trolley home and had waited 45 minutes to get on this particular car because there was some breakdown that prevented any trolleys from coming for a long time. The car was PACKED and I was cranky because I was going to have to rush to soccer practice, and I had planned on using the spare half hour I thought I'd have to plan practice. As we pulled into one of the stations, there was a group of kids who looked like they were coming back from a field trip. I recognized one of them as Lilly, a girl from the Clark Park team I coach. I figured she wouldn't recognize me on a crowded trolly, out of the context of soccer, and after only one practice, but hey eyes lit up and she started frantically waving. I saw her say to the person next to her "That's my soccer coach!" Then she turned to me and made sure to enunciate "Hi Sarah!!", all while keeping her hand waving at me wildly. It was so cute, and made the whole wait for the trolley completely worth it.

More to come from my adventures in Philadelphia...