Sunday, November 14, 2010

"It will all be okay"

There is a young homeless woman who frequents our coffee house. I have gotten to know her story a bit over the past few weeks in brief snippets of conversation. Rarely does she come in for more than hot water for a sample tea bag that she received at the co-op next door. But today, she came in excited to buy a hot chocolate. She was able to pan-handle more than she needed for a place to stay tonight and was excited to be able to purchase a treat that would double as a hand warmer in the dropping temps.
As I made her drink, we chatted about how it had been a rough couple days and she had barely found the time to sleep, with having to leave the awning where her and her husband sleep by 7am before the cops come and tell them to leave. The rain and the colder nights that have moved in with the winter's air make it difficult to truly rest and I could tell it's starting to wear on her.
She paid for her drink with a five dollar bill and I handed her a couple dollars and some change in return. She paused for a second looking at the dollar bill on top and then said, "huh, that's strange." I questioned what she was referring to and she showed me the bill that had,
"it will all be okay :)"
simply written across the bill. She smiled and turned away and I got goosebumps and felt confident that those words came across the eyes that needed to see them most.

2 comments:

Men Who Pray said...

It is as if we are all connected in more ways than we know.

Like there is this giant force with no greater desire for us than reconciliation.

Reconciliation with each other, sure, but also reconciliation with the truth.

For have we not all, even in some tiny way, forgotten a bit of the truth. We have started to believe a lie, either about ourselves, or about the world at large.

We make assumptions and generalizations because, if we actually stopped to consider each person as their own beautiful unique individual, we could not hold onto our lies any longer.

It is posts like this one Shannon that force us to stop and take notice. It is posts like this one that wake us up and, at least for a moment, open our eyes to the truth.

Weisman said...

Love.