Tuesday Musings (#38)

Happy Tuesday everyone

I am writing this on Monday evening as I am on the road all day tomorrow and won't get to write until later tomorrow afternoon or more likely it will be early evening. I'll just set the timer for this thing to post itself on Tuesday morning. 

A simple request was met with a significant indignity recently. What cost is a simple request on behalf of one of my children? I will explain. We were travelling home from a family reunion on Sunday morning when the urge to use the bathroom fell upon my daughter. We have all been there, the middle of the highway between there and here and it hits. 

We got off the highway and found a small "service" station and asked to use the facilities. We were shocked with the response from a not so pleasant woman who asked what we were buying. I said that all I wanted was for my daughter to use the facilities and was summarily dismissed and told that there were no public washrooms for non paying customers.

Where have we gotten to when a young stranger and her father ask for assistance in the middle of the morning and the demand for a fee is placed before a simple comfort such as using the washroom. We were pleasant, polite and are certainly non threatening, yet the request for a fee or at least to purchase something is the currency for common courtesy and decency. Where are the simple kindnesses that are missed in such circumstances? What evil lurked in this woman's life that caused her to be rude and uncaring? I left knowing I will never return to that small town ever again. 

And yet!

Forgiveness has been granted. It must be granted without reservation. In the midst of my feelings of ill will towards this woman, I remembered the gift of forgiveness that has been extended to me while I still defamed that great love. I stand condemned for harbouring ill feelings towards the little town that we stopped in. May I always remember that moment when I am asked for a simple kindness and never have to think twice before I say yes.

In all of life's challenges lie a lesson. Mine was this: listen to the request and where possible go beyond the known parameters to supply gentleness and fulfill the requests of others. Be gentle, kind, loving and always extend a hand to a stranger who needs something, even if it is out of the ordinary. Always a lesson, that's the story of my life.

Happy Tuesday everyone