What Goes Around...Comes Around!

Today, while waiting on line to pick up prescriptions for my parents, I overheard the woman in front of me tell the counter clerk that she was $2.00 short for her prescriptions, so she would take only the high blood pressure one and would come back some other time, when she had more money. I had a bunch of singles in my purse, so I stepped up and handed the woman $3.00. She was surprised and at first turned me down, but I told her that I would rather give the money to someone who truly needed it, than to a panhandler in the subway. (Either way, the money was going towards drugs! hahaha.) I told her that I know how important medications can be, and that in the past people had helped me. So, she graciously accepted my dollars and wanted my phone number so she could arrange to pay me back. I told her that in the future, she could give the money to another person in need....you know, in the spirit of the "Pay it Forward" thing. I shook her hand and left quickly.

Someone did help me in the recent past. On Christmas Eve, two years ago, I was driving to Philadelphia, to visit my daughter in the hospital. The roads were extremely icy, but I was determined to see my daughter. While going downhill, my old mini-van slid off the road into a snowbank. My other daughter and I got out of the van to survey the damage. There was no damage to the van, but we were deeply stuck into the snow. Within five minutes, a station wagon stopped. A lone woman got out and asked if we needed help. She said she had a shovel. She got the shovel out of the back of her car, and proceeded to dig out my van. I tried to wrest the shovel from her to do it myself...she appeared to be older than me...but she insisted on doing the deed herself. When she was finished, I tried to give her $20.00 (that was all that I could spare at the time.) But she refused the money, wished us a "Merry Christmas" and drove off. It was as if an angel had appeared and helped us in our "time of need". (I know, quite the cliche'....and who believes in angels, anyway?)

So, I am still $17.00 ahead.....after giving that woman $3.00 today. If each of us would just help someone else, once in a while, the world would be a much better place!