There’s a joke I heard a long time ago, and I think about it often.
A revivalist preacher comes into a small Western town. All week, he passes out flyers he made himself, builds his big tent alone, sets out more than a thousand chairs, carefully stacks the paper programs on a table so the wind won’t take them, places water jugs at every corner, and raises a large cross that can be seen from far off in the distance.
Sunday comes, and he sees no one.
Then ten o’clock hits, and one cowboy shows up.
The preacher waits a bit, pacing around, then finally asks, “Where is everybody?”
The cowboy shrugs. “Don’t know.”
The distraught preacher sighs. “I don’t know what I should do.”
The cowboy says, “Well, partner, if I went out to feed the cows and only one showed up…”
He pauses.
“…I’d sure feed him.”
Inspired by the cowboy’s wisdom, the preacher steps to the pulpit and begins preaching as he has never preached before. He talks about the fall and the blessings. His voice trembles as he speaks of forgiveness and sacrifice. Then he rises into a thundering shout about accountability. He cries over all that has been lost. He nearly leaps with excitement when he reaches glory.
When it’s finally over, he comes down sweating and out of breath and asks the cowboy, “How… did… you… like the service?”
The cowboy nods and says, “Well, I said I’d feed the cow, not bury him in the chow.”
I remember this joke not because it makes me laugh, but because it has a lot of meaning for me. It reminds me to do my best in my work, not to be excessive.
Years ago, when I owned my business, the police department came by asking local businesses for donations. We gave, and in return they handed us tickets to a concert featuring The Tokens, best known for “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.” This was around the time The Lion King had come out a year or two earlier, so the song was having another moment.
I remember I almost didn’t go. Even though I’m not exactly young anymore, The Tokens still predated me by quite a bit. But I thought it would be a nice night out with my wife, and besides, it was free. We arrived early and sat in the third row, center seats. Hardly anyone else was there—maybe one other couple. As showtime got closer, the crowd never really grew. Twenty people at most. The venue, though small, could have held two or three thousand.
Then they came out and performed. Man, they preformed as if it was a full sports stadium.
I remember that no one sat in the first two rows in front of us. The horn player ran across the stage, switching between two horns and sometimes playing both at once, performing with incredible energy. These men, whose careers began in the 1950s, were probably in their seventies and still giving their all. At one point during the show, they exchanged instruments. The singer told stories about songwriting and the members they had lost over the years.
To say it was a great experience would be an understatement. They were true professionals. And for me, it became another lesson.
The crowd size was not the lesson. It was a test. A test in character. What I remember most was the standard they brought to the work when there was little applause waiting for them.
In a moment like that, I realized the real audience was not me or the other people in the chairs. The real audience had to be the band themselves. It had to be. Twenty people in a small city could not have made much difference to a band that had been playing for that long.
I believe we are always watching ourselves. We know when we give less because no one is looking. We know when we lower our standard because the reward seems small. And we know when we do the work well, not for praise, but because we would rather live as someone who takes their work seriously.
That brings me to a time many years later. I held a Fourth 0f July event and hired a local band. They arrived but didn’t want to start because they felt that not enough people had shown up. Boy, that really disturbed me. Here was a group still trying to make a name for itself, with no hit records and no long history behind it, hesitating to play for the people who did come.
Meanwhile, I had watched The Tokens, a group with top-40 hits and a number-one song, give their all to a room with fewer than 20 people.
The lesson seems simple, but it has followed me for years. Teachers instruct those present. Servers attend to the customer who walks through the door. Entertainers perform for the people in the room. And writers write for whoever the reader may be.
But beneath all of that there is the audience that we never escape…
Ourselves.
We do the work well not only because others may see it, but because we have to live with the kind of person we become while doing it.
Albert Jr.
Author of The Nature Within Us
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