The Kindness of Strangers

I was overwhelmed by the kindness of strangers today. Sylvie and I ventured out to the grocery store. I was planning on it being no more than 45 minutes and was pretty sure she'd just sleep the entire time. She is very comfortable in her car seat and loves the motion of the car. So we strolled through Harris Teeter while I picked up some things we needed. I wasn't paying much attention to how many people were in the store because it really didn't look like much. (They are calling for more snow tomorrow and the Safeway in our neighborhood was closed by the fire marshal due to the danger of the roof collapsing. So it was quite possible that there would be crowding in HT.)

Well when we went to check out, we found all the people. Yikes! They had about 10 lanes open and each line was about 10 people deep. Sylvie woke up when we were in the 5th spot in line. At first I moved the shopping cart back and forth and that pacified her a bit. But she was hungry (my 45 minute plan was now going on 90 minutes) and she cued the pink tera dactyl and began wailing. The amazing people in front of me all insisted I go in front of them. At first I politely refused because they'd all been waiting in this long line. But the 3 mothers in the group insisted and the kind gentleman who was at the front followed suit. It was incredible- they parted like the red sea for this little lady and ushered us to the front of the line. At this point I had Sylvie out of the car seat and was rocking her so she had quieted down. Everyone commented on how small and sweet she was and I swear I had tears in my eyes as I thanked them. (hormones maybe- but they were just so kind!) I tucked Sylvie in to my jacket and pushed the cart out of the store. I was almost to the car when a lady and her husband stopped and she asked, "Do you need help?" I politely refused, but she also insisted that her husband load my grocery bags in to the car. Again, I was overwhelmed. What kind neighbors we have! What a beautiful world we live in.