My Korean Deli_ Risking It All for a Convenience Store - Ben Ryder Howe [52]
Of course, Kay’s not the only one with compulsive tendencies. Where I come from, not hurrying is practically an article of religious faith. America’s grown-ups don’t rush; they throw their arms around the world and try to make it stand still. There’s a stubbornness about it, a refusal to give in to the forward motion of time, as if the future itself is just a fad. Nobody drives where they can walk, nobody vacuums what they can sweep, and nobody microwaves (God forbid) what they can cook on an old-fashioned burner. “Fashion” and “technology” are dirty words. Not surprisingly, when it comes to big projects—fixing up a house, say, or the type of renovations we’re engaged in at the store—nothing but the most exacting, time-consuming process will do.
On the appointed day, undeterred by Kay’s ticking stopwatch, I arrive early with a detailed plan, and things get off to a promising start. Edward, to my surprise, shows up with his occasional partner Ling, a Cantonese electrician, as well as Gab’s uncle Jinsuk, who happens to be a professional carpenter. Wonder of wonders, I think, with all this extra manpower, we might actually accomplish some things! However, as I soon discover—to my horror—these people, all being small business owners themselves, are just as hardheaded and independent-minded as Kay. There’s no cooperation. There isn’t even a plan. People just start taking things apart and rebuilding them willy-nilly. Soon the store is filled with the racket of a construction zone and a great choking cloud of sawdust. For a while I try to organize things and at least get people to coordinate; but there’s a big difference, I realize, between me and the trio of Edward, Ling and Jinsuk: they have power tools and I don’t.
Meanwhile, as my dreams for the store disintegrate, through the haze I see Kay standing there with her hands on her hips, hounding everyone to go faster, faster, faster.
“Can you please get her to lay off a little?” I ask Gab, feeling as if my stomach is writhing with poisonous snakes that want to come out and bite everyone. “It’s stressful enough in here.”
“I’ll try,” she says wearily. Once again Gab is serving as a sort of human buffer zone between two silently warring parties. Kay and I never argue—not directly, anyway. Oh, we clash over just about everything, from coffee to the renovations, and we criticize each other as brutally as any son-in-law/mother-in-law combo, often while standing in the same room, but because of the language barrier there’s no need for diplomacy. After all, when we need to communicate and be respectful (something that’s especially important for me as the son-in-law), we can rely on Gab to act as a filter.
This puts a terrible burden on Gab, however, and on top of all the other stress she’s dealing with, it’s beginning to take its toll. We’re all strung out, but Gab looks particularly miserable.
As the day goes on and Kay’s deadline nears, paranoia creeps in. Gab and her parents are conferring in Korean, and I’m watching them from a few feet away, hoping to pick up a few words. It’s indicative of how crazed the day is making me that I consider for a second “accidentally” knocking down part of a wall or cutting some wires to make finishing today impossible. No, of course I won’t do that. That would be sabotage. But then hadn’t I recently discovered Kay deliberately undermining one of my goals? After finding an old box of CaféAmerica under the sink, she’d started secretly offering it to longtime customers, brewing a whole separate pot and selling it at the old price of ten cents less than the new coffee.
I was outraged. “Your mother is impossible. I can’t work with her anymore,” I railed at Gab, who promised to stop Kay from freelancing. But freelancing is exactly what small business tends to bring out. If I don’t do it, no one will is what you constantly end up saying to yourself. Sometimes the attitude is helpful. For instance, since we opened the store we’ve been