217. My Friend Mike

We all have that favorite delivery spot we turn to in our most challenging times. Maybe it’s Thai food after a long work day, or a pizza brought straight to your door during a break up. For Nora, it’s a Jersey Mike’s sandwich. 

Transcripts may not appear in their final version and are subject to change.

Nora: I’m Nora McInerny, and this is It’s Going to Be Okay.  Look, I know a lot of things are not okay. I know a lot of things will never be okay. And I also know that when I’m about to fall into the pit of despair, just noticing one small okay thing has kept me clinging to the edge by one ragged fingernail. 

And that’s what we do here. Monday through Friday, we are here to put a little bit of okay in your day to help you start or end or endure your day with the opposite of a doom scroll. 

Today’s episode is not sponsored content, but God do I wish it was.  I am a person who often  will eat the same thing. Every single day for months and months and months and months and then never again and then come back to it Maybe a year later.

Maybe three months later.  I Am NOT a foodie. I’ll be honest food is just kind of like I don’t know if it’s there I’ll eat it. My favorite kind of food is a lot of food preferably a lot of  like what people consider bad food, unhealthy food, trashy food. Sometimes I just want to eat an entire box of cereal with a gallon of whole milk, regardless of what my guts tell me to do.

Okay? The heart wants what it wants. Mary Oliver said to let the soft animal of our body love what it loves. And what my body loves right now?  is Jersey Mike’s. I’m talking about Jersey Mike’s subs. Why did I spend so much time? In my younger years, going to Subway, cause I didn’t know about Jersey Mike’s, cause he was probably only in Jersey, and I was in the Midwest, doing my best, and collecting Subway stamp cards, and possibly doing a light amount of fraud when a friend of a friend worked there. 

That’s not what this is about.  This isn’t about Subway. This is about Jersey Mike’s. This is about the fact.  that I can get an actual sandwich. Sandwiches are never better than when someone else makes them for you. I know the ingredients for a sandwich. I’ve purchased the ingredients for a sandwich numerous times.

If I make my own sandwich, I don’t want it. Immediately, I think it’s lacking something. What it is lacking is the loving hands of a Jersey Mike’s employee who asks, Is that an allergy? When I ask for gluten free bread, and I have to say, Not exactly. I’m celiac, so it’s not an allergy. I won’t die, but I will poop my pants.

And he says, No problem. I’ll wipe down the counter. And I say, Great. Wonderful. What, what making my own sandwich doesn’t give me is  it being  Securely wrapped in paper, sliced precisely down the middle,  just, it’s, my sandwiches are too, even with every condiment I have, I can’t get  The satisfaction of a wet Subway Zoom, of a wet Jersey Mike’s  Sub.

I can’t do it. I can’t do it. I love walking into Jersey Mike’s. I love sitting there quietly being the only person who says, No, actually I’ll take that for here.  I love getting it delivered,  exchanging, a nice little,  really well crafted brown paper bag with a stranger who says, Jersey Mike’s again?  Because it’s always the same delivery person that I get.

And I say, yep.  And he says, okay, see you tomorrow. And usually he does see me tomorrow. Unless I decide, you know what, I’m going to walk. I’m going to go for a walk and I’m going to eat it in the Jersey Mike’s establishment.  I don’t know why, but this felt like a thing that I had to confess to somebody. So I did.

I texted a friend and I said,  guess what I’m eating today?  I’m eating Jersey Mike’s. And you know what she said? Me too. I’m I love Jersey Mike’s and the more people I told about this secret love affair with Jersey Michael as my friend Michelle calls him  the more I learned a lot of people Share the same secret love he is not just my lover.

He’s the lover of all  people who enjoy sandwiches, I know this is a How am I gonna conclude this one  so look again not sponsored Not sponsored. This is the purest love. The purest love that you can have is not familial, okay, it’s not romantic. It is getting exactly what you wanted for lunch from a faceless corporation. 

And having that lunch be the high point of your day so many days in a row that you record a podcast episode about it.  If you too.  are thrilled by Jersey Mike’s. I don’t care if you, you know, honestly, I don’t care what it is.  If you get  a little spark of light in your heart  by the idea of lunch,  I want you to follow that spark.

I want you to follow that spark. And if it leads you to Jersey Mike’s, wonderful.  That’s my okay thing today. That’s my okay thing is that I already have my order locked and loaded. It 30 minutes.  And it’ll arrive  tomorrow, too, because I’m going to do it tomorrow, too.