Finding Ferracci

Today I want to tell a story about a guy named John (a pseudonym).  John’s not a friend, more of an acquaintance, but a guy I’ve gotten to know over a few years via my motorcycle board.  A motorcyclist, (sometime motorcycle racer), musician, and generally good guy.  The fact that the guy can play a gig one weekend and race a Ducati the next makes me twelve shades of Envy Green.

A few years ago, John was let go from a good job.  Suddenly and unexpectedly.  As any reasonable human being would do, he flailed about in desperation for a few days before settling into a determined job hunt.  It wasn’t fast, and it wasn’t easy, but suddenly the clouds parted and a blazing ray of sunshine laid upon John like the finger of the Almighty.  He interviewed for, and won, a job at a motorcycle shop.  Not just any shop:  Fast By Ferracci.  That name surely means nothing to most of you, but the motorcyclists among you just got a lot more interested.  That’s because FBF isn’t just a motorcycle shop; they’ve also sponsored race teams that have won both AMA and World Superbike titles.  More than once.

For many a motorcyclist, working for Eraldo Ferracci is a dream job.  It was for John, who not only got to work there, but also got partial sponsorship and parts discounts to race a Ducati.  Hard to beat that with a stick!

That was a couple of years ago.  A few weeks ago, John’s longtime live-in girlfriend suddenly split with him.  Again, with no real warning and not much explanation.  Again, he floundered for a while…but then picked himself up and found that as he reconnected with himself, not the self that he’d lapsed comfortably into during his relationship (as even the best of us tend to do) but a more genuine self, he found someone he liked.  A lot.

And that was apparently contagious, as he soon found himself paired up with a female friend who’d also just ended a long relationship.  And, he said, did he mention she’d done a little modeling?  It’s amazing how things work out, he said.

I replied that for the last several years “Finding Ferracci” has been my own personal shorthand for looking for that one thing that you didn’t even know you needed, sometimes when you need it most.  I told him that “Finding Ferracci” twice in a decade must mean he was livin’ right.

For me, just knowing John’s story to be true always serves as a little ray of hope when things look bleak.  A reminder that sometimes the world or God or karma or the Great Tao work in ways that make little sense at the time but can bring us to peace in the end.

So I hold out a warm feeling of hope for a good friend.  If anybody can pull an opportunity from a crisis, she can.

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