Some free advice, or at least solidarity
NASHVILLE, Ind. – Mandy Samulak lounges in a lawn chair on the side of the road. She smiles and waves at each passing car, but it’s mostly her old ironing board that catches people’s attention.
“Free advice!” reads the cardboard sign draped over the board.
She’s been out nearly every Saturday for more than a month, ever since it warmed up enough to sit outside. When cars drive past, some people just laugh and drive on, while others are afraid to even make eye contact. Some stop and ask what she’s doing.
“I’m just a lonely extrovert,” she tells them. “I miss people.”
Samulak, a 45-year-old from Brown County, Indiana, was feeling cooped up in quarantine.
She lives out in the woods where she can’t even see her neighbors. As a preschool assistant and karaoke DJ, she was used to being an extrovert. She missed funny, awkward, occasionally profound chats with strangers.
Once her two teen boys realized she was serious about the free advice stand, they were mortified. But her husband knew it’d be good for her. So she grabbed the ironing board – she couldn’t remember the last time she used it – and carried it to the road.
Some clients just stop to ask for directions. Others confide in her about serious life problems, such as marital issues, though she’s no professional therapist.
Ever since George Floyd died in Minneapolis police custody, she tries to talk about racism and the Black Lives Matter movement with those who will listen. She’s white, so she knows she’ll never understand the pain black Americans experience, but she wants to use her privilege – and chattiness – to raise awareness.
She enjoys lighthearted conversation, too. One time, two men approached her and said they were gathering evidence of Bigfoot. They asked if she’d ever seen or heard anything in the woods that she couldn’t explain.
“Nothing that science can’t explain,” she answered.
Whether they’re asking for real advice or not, Samulak thinks each client just wants human connection.
Humans are naturally worrisome. We worry about jobs, about our relationships, about what we should eat for breakfast, whether we’re good enough. Now, cue coronavirus and a summer of upheaval. Sickness. Death. Racism. Protests. Politics. Unemployment. Grief.
Nearly every day, some prominent person says these are “unprecedented times.” The days blur together yet feel wildly unpredictable. Things that felt certain before – school, mass transit, the all-you-can-eat buffet – have been ripped away.
But no question is unanswerable for Samulak, she said – even if the answer is “I don’t know.”
A few weeks ago, around college graduation time, some Indiana University-Bloomington graduates stopped to see her. They asked what advice she would give to someone on the cusp of adulthood.
First, she was practical. “Always use a condom.”
Then, she was understanding. You don’t have to have everything figured out, now or ever. Even if life feels impossible, nothing lasts forever.
It wasn’t groundbreaking advice. She knows that. But everyone, no matter how introverted or extroverted they are, deserves to be reassured, she said. Everybody needs somebody. Everyone wants to be loved.
But she’s still human, which means she worries. Sometimes she has to remember her own advice:
Don’t worry so much. Nothing lasts forever. You don’t have to have everything figured out.