A small kindness makes a big difference (London)

 

Went to the veg stall just outside Turnpike Lane Tube station (Piccadilly line) to get some ginger and other veg for my 80-year-old student and her 83-/84-year-old husband.  

    She can’t carry heavy food items (like apples and pears), so I’ve taken to getting them for her and delivering them.  

    Gives me the exercise I wouldn’t undertake otherwise, as I’m so bad at self discipline.  As a loner, I can stay at home all day, so I need the external motivation: going out to do massage and Long G (Longevitology energy adjustments) for people in pain, shopping for old people, and (during the growing season) helping out at the vegetable allotments watering and weeding.

    It was a grey-as-grey-can-get day, with a light drizzle (my iPhone weather forecast only said “Cloudy”, with no mention of rain), so I was glad that I was forced to go out for my exercise.

    In addition to the asked-for ginger, I ended up buying garlic, okra (ladies’ fingers / bindhi) and Brussels sprouts, all adding up to quite a few kilos.  Oh, plus items I’d bought a few days earlier for her: oranges, French beans and spring onion.

    Lugging my loads (one lot in the rucksack on my back, one lot in a big supermarket strong bag), I started to walk down the steps for the Tube.

    Saw an old lady (West Indian, I felt; my age or so) laboriously coming up the steps, with a big supermarket strong bag: hauling the bag up one step in front of her, putting it down on the step, then climbing the step, hauling the bag up another step, putting it down, then climbing the step.  No, she didn't have a walking stick.

    I went forward and offered to help her with her load, in spite of the two I already had.  I commented on how heavy her bag was.  

    At the top, I asked her how far she had to go, thinking I might make a detour and go with her all the way home.  She said the weight was just from the books in the bag, which she was going to drop off at the charity shop the other side of the crossroads, so I left it at that, as I had my own delivery to make.

    She thanked me, and said, “You are an angel.”  Then, she added, “You are MY angel!”

    Brought tears to my eyes.

    Takes so little to bring a bit of sunshine into someone’s heart — me making her feel so blessed to have someone come along to help, and her making me feel so useful and glad I’d decided to step in rather than just walk by.

(London, 2024)