Getting It Wrong

Man drops english muffin jam side down on the floor

Sam was having one of those days, where he couldn’t do anything right. He dropped his english muffin on the floor jam-side down, so the three-second rule didn’t apply. He had stopped to tie his shoes and missed the bus. His lunch box was empty at lunchtime. He had left it on the bench where that homeless man was sitting when he went to look for possible taxis. The homeless man must have taken his food.

He grumbled through the rest of the day. The printer ran out of toner. He spilled hot coffee on his shoes when he bumped against the door jam when he grabbed Ms. Sommersby the arm. She was teetering a bit on her 3” high heels.

“Thank you. These shoes are going to make me fall someday.” Sam said nothing but noted the staircase she had been teetering toward.

On the way out, he stopped to get a sausage-on-a-bun and missed his bus again. In frustration, he gave the sausage to a stray dog (he looked like he could use it) and the bun to the pigeons strutting around his feet. (They certainly were looking.)

Oh well, he might as well start home. He might make it before another bus came. But as he came to the corner of Second and Marion it began to rain—not a drizzle but a genuine downpour. He stepped under the shelter of a marble doorway. ‘They don’t build them the way they used to,’ he thought, and then he saw the sign saying the building was going to be demolished to make space for another shiny new soulless highrise.

He rummaged in his briefcase for his folding umbrella. When he looked up he saw an old woman with a cane struggling up Marion. He approached to offer her his arm, only to have her take a swing at him with her cane. “Stay away! I don’t need any whippersnapper’s help, especially if he wants to mug me!”

“Oh, no ma’am!” Sam said. “I just wanted to help. Perhaps you might like the use of this umbrella? It is pouring!”

The old woman turned and stared at him, her eyebrows arched. “Well, I never! A do-gooder. I should take you up on that offer, just so you learn the only reward you can expect is to get wet!” She reached out for the umbrella and smiled.

Sam handed it to her and smiled back.

Ah, perhaps he needed to reevaluate his day. He had fed a homeless man. He had prevented Ms Sommers from falling down the stairs. He fed a stray dog and some pigeons. And he had made that old woman’s day just a little bit better. Not a bad price to pay for a soaking!

When he got home he discovered he had left his keys at the office. “Oh well. I wonder who I am supposed to help now?” He grinned and set off down the street with a spring in his step.