A Feast of Friends

I think it was Tom Smith, the trainer of Seabiscuit, who said that you don't have to give up on a
horse just because he may be a little beat up. And Charles Howard, his owner, that said, "when the
little guy doesn't know he's the little guy then he can do some great things, " and not to lose faith just
because he may have lost a few races. Sometimes you gain more by losing than by winning. That
could not have been more accurate in speaking about my life as well.

I was definitely beaten up and had done my share of losing mainly due to my own selfish pride and
ego. I quit my job at Wal-Mart, got a bottle of wine, and went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead
Man's Chest. I had lost my will to live and didn't enjoy life anymore. Nothing held any meaning to
me any longer and I was unemployed for about 5 months. We even got news that Grandpa Bud had
been diagnosed with lung cancer and was beginning chemo therapy treatments. It never really set
in that it might kill him. I thought that he could beat anything and it seemed like the treatments
were keeping it in check at the time.

I finally got a job at Books-A-Million in Fort Smith. I was used to getting treated like crap and
dealing with politics at Wal-Mart so when these people welcomed me into their lives...I felt
something good for the first time in a long time. There were just like 12 people that worked there
as staff compared to 300 at Wal-Mart. They said please and thank you to me. They told me I did a
good job and I began to trust that they genuinely did care about me. So, I started to come out of my
shell little by little. I can totally connect with Seabiscuit on something like that. You can take the
Thorkin out of the wild but you can't take the wild out of the Thorkin. It took a while but these
people, employees and customers, started to seem like family to me and I cared about them. I took
pride in making them smile and taking them to all the crazy books I had read.

We were the BAM #390 Crew and we relied on each other. One of the times that really stuck out
in my mind was the midnight release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I had never read
the books (and didn't until 2011) but everyone in the store had so Amy, our GM, took us all to see
the movies and got caught up. We had so many games and activities planned and it was a packed
house but everything turned out great. When midnight arrived, I led the way in front of the huge
pallet of books all the way up to the front of the store. I cleared a path and could feel the buzzing
of excitement as we took their tickets and began giving them their books. We were there until
well after 2AM trying to clean everything up but we sat back in the office and talked and told
stories. The Harry Potter crowd was pretty ordinary and left with their books quietly but the
Breaking Dawn crowd (of teenage girls dressed up in prom dresses) trashed the entire place but
it's all good as I was having the time of my life.

It had been a while since grandpa and me had a little talk. We went out into the garden...the place
we spent so much time when I was younger. I would listen to his every word about how his dad
once got a cornhusk go all the way through his hand and had my grandpa cut it out with a pocket
knife. His hands were always so strong and tan from working out in the sun. I even remember a
time when some Jehovah's Witnesses came up on the porch one day. Most people would act like
they weren't home but he fixed them a cup of coffee and talked with them outside. They asked him
if he knew that heaven was really on earth. I will never forget what he told them. He just smiled
peacefully like only he could and responded, "as long as you make it there, does it really matter
where it is?" They just smiled and had to agree.

My grandpa never judged me even though he could have. He would just say you know better than
that and he was right. I did. I once was told that I had to get up early and take him to his chemo
because no one else could and all I could think about was that I had to get up early on my day off
and have to drive all the way to Fort Smith.....but it was later one of the greatest days of my life.
We talked the way there and I got to see him get that thing plugged into him and basically get
poison pumping into him just to kill another pioson inside him. It made him weak and tired and
sickly all the time but he never complained. He smiled and took it like a trooper...like a true man.
He had a silent strength and solid determination about him but he was always smiling. I had lost
my smile for quite a long time. I smiled on the outside but never on the inside. I was going to
need it for what was to come and Grandpa Bud would save me one final time. In his death, he
showed me how life should be lived. He would teach me how to believe in the impossible once again..........and how love truly conquers all.

-Thork