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"He always asked for two Equals for his coffee."

It was just a throw-away line, overheard while standing in line at McDonald's this morning, but for some reason it caught my attention.

You need to get the picture here. Most mornings I drop by my local McDonald's in Burlington to get a coffee. I am usually late or nearly late for work, and with regularity I find myself becoming even more late because of all the old guys who also go to McDonald's every morning for the so called Senior Coffee.

I guess the Senior Coffee is a deal because always there are old men waiting, sitting, talking when I arrive. Frankly, sometimes they make me impatient. I am a fireball ready to burn my way up the highway to work, and they are flickering embers slowly but surely burning out. And they take so long to order that coffee and to pull that change from their pockets to pay for it. It makes me crazy.

C'mon, move it, buddy. That is what I am thinking most of the time. But not today.

I asked the McDonald's clerk what he was talking about. Who always asked for two Equals for his coffee? I had become one of those people slowing down the line by engaging in time-consuming chitchat. One of those people I usually want to bat upside the head for dragging the rest of us into an idle world. I wanted the details.

Turns out that one of the old-guy regulars, who sat at that table right over there, came in every morning, always asked for two Equals in his coffee, had died last night. Unexpectedly. The other old-guy regulars had been talking about him this morning. The McDonald's clerk had overheard, and the news had affected him, too.

Funny thing. I felt the need to say a prayer for the old man. I did not know him. I am not overly religious. I don't even think that I am that nice of a person. But I said a prayer for the old man.

This news was something that struck deep inside me. Consider how one day you could be hanging around a McDonald's. Two Equals, please. And the next day, pow. Finito.

I have been thinking about the Two Equals Guy all morning. I wonder what he was like? Was he a veteran of World War II? Did he have children? Was anyone with him when he died? I hope he wasn't alone.

I find myself actually caring about him.

And, so, I say a prayer for him because I do not know what else to do. Except, perhaps, be a little more patient with the old guys the next time I am in McDonald's in the morning because, well, you know why.

Thomas Nelson is an associate professor in the School of Communications at Elon University. Contact him at nelsont@elon.edu.