Parallel Vocations, Bad Potatoes, and Sales Tactics

Should I keep this image, or use the new one from last week? Let me know in the comments. 

Whew. Busy week (hence, why I'm a day late). 

1.) Anniversary

Chris and I had our 7th wedding anniversary this past week. 

We still like each other, so that's good. 

Seriously though, we still genuinely like being in each other's company. There's been a lot of change and challenges for both of us in the past few years, and I'm deeply grateful to have had a spouse who's my best friend through all of it. It's been amazing seeing the ways that he's grown and changed and the things he's taken a new interest in during the time we've been married. I like who we are, and I have a great deal of hope for who we'll become. 

We like to try and do something as a family in addition to as a couple, so this year we decided to combine both and drive a few hours up the road to San Antonio for a few days.

It was...interesting, as you'll see in the next couple takes. 

2.) High Pressure Sales Lesson

We were able to leave town for a few days in part because we got hooked by a sales lady at a Bass Pro Shop selling resort timeshares a few months ago. Turns out, there's an introductory thing where you can get four nights at a swanky hotel for the price of one night at said swanky hotel and a few Bass Pro gift cards to boot-- IF you agree to listen to a two hour sales presentation trying to sell you on vacations timeshare points while you're there. 

It's the first time in my life where family money has gone to such a thing, and I was pretty skeptical at the time. Chris really thought it was a worthwhile deal though, so I agreed to it, and there we were. 

Timeshare vacation points are, I'll just say it, absolutely nowhere on the family radar. We ain't that rich, nor swanky (we were actually technically too poor to even be there- we're a few thousand dollars per year under the income eligibility cutoff. We found this out after we'd already bought in, via their website. Sales lady did a bad job screening us).

There we sat in the presentation room, three children under the age of 7 with us, about to sit through a product presentation that had absolutely no relevance to our lives in any way, shape, or form. 

To make the most of what promised to be otherwise a very frustrating couple hours, I decided to reverse-engineer the thing and take notes on what tactics the salesman was using. The kids thankfully were happy with the provided beanbag chairs and the paint with water and picture books we'd brought, and the baby slept contentedly on my chest the whole time, leaving me free to scribble away. 

After being subjected to a very enthusiastic portly gentleman who (among other things: I'll probably do a separate post just on this) - 

- Told personal stories to forge a connection to the prospective clients

- Invited personal interaction by asking everyone to talk about fun vacations they'd been on

- Made a case that "investing" in their timeshare points program would be a worthwhile financial investment based on a "typical" vacation budget (which was about twice to ten times the amount our family tends to spend on trips and vacations) 

- Showed a video of enthusiastic middle aged and somewhat elderly folks giving glowing testimonials of their timeshare vacation experiences

we ended up being shown into a VERY loud room throbbing with music and crowded with salesmen, one per couple that attended, trying their absolute hardest to convince people to buy in. 

Our poor fellow was a very nice man named Diego. We put the poor fellow through the wringer. 

Diego: "How much do you typically spend on vacations?" 

Us: "Oh, a few hundred dollars." (a vacation for us is usually traveling to see out of state family or going camping at a state park. Far less than the couple THOUSAND the sales presentation had given as a "typical example") 

Diego: "Ok...uh...what's your dream vacation? When do you think you'd realistically be able to go?" 

Us: "Europe. But probably not until the kids are teenagers." 

Diego: ((glancing over towards our small, rowdy children who are currently running laps around his desk while laughing manically)) "Ok...why don't I show you a sample of the type of accommodation you'd have at our resorts if you buy into our program?" 

((Walks us to a penthouse type suite at the very top of the hotel, walks us all the way back to the sales floor))

Long story short, we were there for more than an hour with the guy desperately trying to find an angle on us. I genuinely felt sorry for Diego-- salesmen work on commission, and we were frankly a massive waste of time for him. It seemed like a decent product, just not one that we had any inclination or reason to buy.

 We ended up getting his number and promising to pass it along to a wealthy relative of ours who does like to take nicer vacations, in the hope that maybe it'd be a somewhat fruitful ordeal for him. 

And I got a free sales technique lesson out of it. 

3.) The Tea Garden

If the sales presentation was the most stressful planned activity, the Japanese Tea Garden was probably the most relaxing. 

It's probably the most beautiful area in the city of San Antonio. Like many beautiful things, it has a somewhat tragic backstory to boot. 

In 1908, a Japanese immigrant named Eizo Jingu moved to San Antonio, was hired by the city park's commission, and began building the garden in a huge pit left by a quarry. It was a highlight of the city, bringing people from all around to come and see it. He worked away at it for years, making something truly beautiful (seriously...imagine Mr. Miagi's garden from The Karate Kid and multiply that x5. The place is drop dead beautiful). He died, and stewardship of the garden, owned by the city, passed to his family. 

Then Pearl Harbor and WWII happened. Anti Japanese sentiment ran rampant. The city forced the family out of the garden, turned over the property to a Chinese family, and renamed the place the "Chinese Tea Garden".  The Jingu family moved to California, leaving their family's legacy behind them. 

In 1984, the city of San Antonio changed the name of the garden back to the "Japanese Tea Garden", and invited the family to the re-naming ceremony, effectively apologizing for what happened. Though a concrete arch saying "Chinese Tea Garden" is still on the property (made by an EXTREMELY talented Mexican concrete artist, but that's another story) a plaque sits next to it explaining the origins and proper name of the garden, and the history of the family that lived there. 

We got some iced teas at the little tea shop and wandered around until it got too hot. It's really a magical place: well worth the visit if you're ever in that neck of the woods.  

4.) "Candy" Cereal 

We bought Cookie Crisp cereal for the kids for the trip. 

We never buy sugary cereal like that. 

I ate two bowls of the leftover cereal while writing this. You are now all witness to my shame. 

5.) In Sickness (Lack of Health) 

Note I left for the maid. God bless her. 

As must happen every few trips or so, people got sick. 

I was first, with a slight sore throat and headache that became more pronounced as we sat through the sales pitch stuff. That night I was feverish and had chills, and we ended up eating take-out fast food for supper rather than the nice dinner we had planned. 

Thankfully, I was feeling much better by morning. After a very lovely day in New Braunfuls (town just north of San Antonio with its own really neat culture and attractions), we headed to what turned out to be a very disappointing late, loud, cold steak dinner (accompanied by mashed potatoes that had raw potato chunks in it) served by an incompetent, abnormally slow waiter at what was supposed to be a nice restaurant. 

And that night, one of the kids came down with something we think might have been mild food poisoning. 

Thankfully the vomiting stopped by the time we packed up to go home the next morning and didn't come back, but the poor kid had an off and on fever for the rest of the day. 

We sent a very strongly worded email to the restaurant. We'll see if anything comes of it. 

6.) Vows 

Picture of a perpetual vow ceremony her order had a few years ago.

On a much more cheerful note, I got to go to the profession of perpetual vows for a friend of mine who's a religious sister for a missionary order today. 

We've been friends since we were both little girls in the same homeschool co-op, and have been pen-pals since college. Our friendship has meant a lot to me over the years: she's the only friend I have and have kept in contact with who's my age and who started discerning and pursuing their vocation at the same time that I did. In a lot of ways, even though our paths have turned out to be really different, it's meant a lot that they've seemed to run parallel. It's hard to explain, but I feel affirmed in my own vocation by seeing how joyfully and enthusiastically she lives out hers.

And she's been there for me and hasn't shied away from the hard stuff I've faced with Church abuse. She's actually been willing to talk with me and wrestle through some of the spiritual aspects of that. And that's meant a lot. Not many people are willing to do that. 

She wasn't able to make my wedding (she wanted to, but had to leave town for her novitiate assignment at the time literally the morning of), but I was able to make hers. 

I'm so very thankful. It was a huge blessing. 

7.) The TLM-pocalypse 

If you have no idea what I'm talking about...I envy you. And I recommend just skipping this take entirely, because it'll just lead you down a rabbit hole of misery.  

 If you sort-of-kind-of know what I'm talking about because of social media but haven't read what sparked it, here's the document from the Pope that's started the firestorm. 

My totally unasked for two cents as a lay person:

I know the Novus Ordo is different than the TLM in some substantial ways, but I'd like to point out that--

- The Novus Ordo can be said ad orientum and in Latin. 

- The music can still be Latin chant. 

-A  ban of the TLM is not a ban on reverence in the liturgy. Not all is lost here. 

Just felt like that needed to be said. I've been seeing a lot of posts saying Latin in the mass is banned now, and that's not the case. A specific set of rubrics, where Latin is the only language allowed, is being banned. 

There's a difference there. 

(This is in no way meant to minimize the loss these communities are feeling. This is near apocalyptic to a lot of people, and bishops are likely going to use this in a way that's very anti- pastoral and will force people from the Church- including their dioceses' most family centered and "alive" parishes. That's not something to be taken lightly by any means. 

To be clear, I think this was a really bad, undiplomatic, and weirdly specific move. 

I just see a lot of posts about it that seem to suggest that we're now all doomed to 1970s post Vatican II clown and polka masses. That's not true. We can still ask and work for increased reverence in the mass: not all has been lost on that front. Though I will admit it's probably now a lot harder). 


See the rest of this week's takes here.