How Wonderful Some Folks Are!

One year ago this week the world shut down, more or less.  And have we ever been on an extraordinary and terrible ride ever since.  It’s one I believe not a single one of us would have signed on for if given any say in the matter at all.  Rick and I had celebrated, with family and friends, the 100th birthday of my beloved Uncle Wayne.  That was one year and two days ago.  There was some harbinger talk by that time – we were hearing of a new, fast-moving, and potentially deadly disease making its way through the Far East.  And I emphasize the word “far,” as it initially seemed such a distance from my loved ones and me as to be a likely non-threat to us.  Oh, how sadly wrong I was!

Two days later, one year ago today, airports in the United States were being shut down, travel sharply curtailed, and advise given to observe strict – very strict – rules of hygiene even inside our own homes.  We were to wash, often and thoroughly.  We were to wear masks inside and out.  We were to leave aged loved ones in other states, in nursing homes, or wherever they might be, alone.  We were, in fact, urged to stay in altogether and not risk the environment outside our individual bubbles.

People started dying and the run on toilet paper began.  And I don’t mean to compare death and the toilet paper fiasco in degrees of awfulness.  It’s just that so much happened so fast and was so terrifying to so many that almost instantaneously everyone’s lives were turned upside-down and inside-out.  All bets were off.  Behaviors changed.  Nothing was the same one day as it had been the day before.

Or was it?

How many of you have been on the receiving end of someone else’s generosity during this challenging time?  And how many have been a blessing to others in some way(s) during this period?

Examples of watching out and doing for others in this past year are plenty.  Here are two, experienced early on; you will know of others.

Stepanie Lux of New York writes, in an article in TheLily on March 26, 2020, where a woman named Nneka McGuire compiled several instances of benevolence: “A teenage boy in our church has been struggling with a brain tumor.  He cannot have visitors, obviously.  The members of our church and his friends in the community decided to show him love and support last night by doing a ‘drive-by.’  Hundreds of cars drove slowly past his house in the dark tooting their horns.  How encouraging that we can still find creative ways to reach out to each other!”

And this one: “While having some routine bloodwork last week, my 96-year-old father-in-law mentioned to the nurse that he and his wife had only one roll of toilet paper left at home and could not find any in his neighborhood supermarket.  He asked her if she knew of a place he might go to find some.  She said she did not. That evening, just as he and his wife were finishing up dinner, there was a knock on the door.  It was that same nurse with a large package of toilet paper.  She and her friend searched at least 10 stores until they found what he needed, and would not take a penny for their troubles.  How wonderful some folks are!”

Too true – how wonderful some folks are.  We’re meant to step up to the plate as necessary.  Some do and some don’t.  When we become aware of another’s needs, we are to meet them if we can, the pandemic aside.  Some did and some didn’t.  But those who reacted as the people noted above probably did the same sort of things before the pandemic and will respond similarly after it ends.

I want to be one of those people – I hope I am one of those people.  And I hope you are too.