A Random Act of Kindness on an Ordinary Day

A random act of kindness turned my ordinary day into something far more memorable than I could have ever imagined. My journey started when I realized I had to go to Walmart for some essentials before the weekend. If you’ve ever gone to Walmart on the weekend it’s a very crowded experience and one I like to avoid. All my kids wanted to tag along and by my kids I mean my two teenagers, boy and girl plus my adult son. After my eldest gets a cart the first thing we do is go down the craft isle. I love crafts! Can you hear the boys? “Aw mom”! This time the journey was to get some yarn so I could knit my daughter a scarf. As we entered the isle I had noticed two ladies at the front of the isle but really didn’t think anything about them because my daughter and I were deeply engrossed with the scarf colors. Boys being boys and bored no less, were fooling around the cart.

Suddenly I felt a soft hand at my shoulder and as I turned I realized it was one of the ladies I’d noticed earlier. “I want you to have this” she says as she presses something into my hand. Shocked I stare at her because I know what money feels like. “With blessings”, stunned as I was, nothing quite coherent was coming out of my mouth as she turned away saying “Bless You” once more. I choked out a thank you and they were gone. I turned to the kids who’d gathered around opening my hand to show them the money she had pressed there. The kids were as stunned as I was. I gathered my wits together and rushed to the end of the isle, heart pounding to thank the lady properly but they had disappeared.

As I was standing there, stunned, heart pounding, feeling quite like I’d run a marathon another woman pulled her cart up to me asking me if I was alright. I Probably gaped at her like a fish, with my hand on my heart I turned again to look down the isle while I told the woman that a lady had just pressed money into my hand. The woman stopped her cart to look down the isle with me remarking that was “so nice”. I agreed looking back at the lady with the cart, she smiled as she walked off repeating her words. I looked at my daughter who had come up next to me and told her I was going to cry, she promptly hurried us down a couple of isles so I could call my husband and tell him what had happened. I admit, I broke down crying on that isle, my husband couldn’t understand why I was crying because it was a wonderful thing that the lady did and I agreed with him.

I thought about those ladies when I got home, I’d heard stories of monetary acts of kindness in the news and aside from a happy feeling knowing there are others out there that care, I wondered why she picked me? Out of all the people at Walmart what made me so important to bestow such a gift on in her eyes? As I write now, I am humbled by a single moment in time, a nameless stranger that will forever be etched in my memory by one act of kindness. Have I ever met other nameless strangers that helped me in my time of need? Yes and they too are remembered by me, however the difference is that I wasn’t in need. That is what’s so humbling, I had my kids around me and I was talking about yarn with my daughter, just an ordinary day and I wasn’t in “need“, I was just a stranger that happened to be right where I was supposed to be at that moment in time, I’d like to believe.

My heartfelt, humbled thank you goes out to a lady who will never know my gratitude and what a difference she affected in me by her single act of random kindness….blessings to all of you.


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