By Robert Dean
Guest Columnist
Sitting in the Midas waiting room is an experience in observation. One minute, a homeless guy wants a free bottle of water after blowing up the bathroom but is too rude to get what he’s after. Then there’s the older lady whose car needed $600 worth of work. She couldn’t afford it, so she drove off; despite the workers warning her that a misfiring engine wasn’t something you ignore.
People came and went. Some needed an alignment, others an oil change. I sat, waiting on new back shocks before piling my two kids, our dog, and my girlfriend into the car for a long road trip to Chicago.
Places like this are a petri dish of American life. A mechanic shop is one of those equalizers; like the doctor’s office or jury duty. Everyone ends up here eventually. What stood out this time was the guy working the counter. We got to talking, like I tend to do, given this is what I do for a living. I told him about just getting back from Europe. He told me he’s never left the state. Hell, never even been on a plane. Never left this town.
We talked about food, about raising kids, about politics because nobody can escape that anymore. But when we got to road trips, his dream wasn’t Paris or Rome. It was Florida. He just wants to fish. Said whenever he gets a chance, he loads up his canoe and heads for the water. That’s where he finds his peace, casting a line, away from the noise.
But that dream felt impossibly far.
He explained what was going on at home. His grandma, some cousins, even his granddad, they’re not legal. His grandfather still works. His grandma? She’s been here fifty years, trying to finish the citizenship process. But she’s afraid to leave the house, scared that walking into a government building might get her deported to a country she hasn’t seen since disco was new.
This isn’t cable news fodder. This Midas is two miles from my house.
I’ve got friends in construction and restaurant kitchens saying the same thing: people aren’t showing up because they’re scared. Job sites are going quiet, kitchens are short-staffed. And nobody’s lining up to fill the gap. We built a system addicted to cheap labor, and now that labor’s drying up, we act surprised.
A living wage is an afterthought. That’s not a left or right issue. It’s universal.
You don’t have to love how someone got here to understand they’re trying to earn a living; just like the guy laying drywall or busting rusted bolts off my shocks. We say, “America First,” but we still expect someone else to wash the dishes, pick the strawberries, and hold the ladder while we shout from the rooftop.
What kind of town are we trying to be?
This country used to be a place people dreamed of. Now it’s all infighting and bad faith dressed up as principle. Somewhere in the noise, we lost the thread. Most of our families came here with nothing but a prayer and a work ethic. Easy to forget, until it’s someone else’s grandma being pulled out of line at the DMV.
The guy fixing your brakes shouldn’t be too scared to show up. Because when he doesn’t, the whole machine starts to rattle.
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