Feet are very important to me. Walking is by far my preferred activity, so I need to be comfortable in my footwear. Last week I went to a chiropodist in Wasaga Beach, to get fitted for new orthotics. Mine are ancient and very well worn. Dave went to the chiro in the morning for another Graston session (muscle scraping technique) on his sore foot. He has recently developed plantar fasciitis, and a neighbour told him that Graston is very helpful.
After my visit, we went over to the Super Centre to pick up a few things. When we went to check out, ahead of us a woman was buying some groceries, and paying was taking a very long time. Dave was ahead of me and the cart was between us, so I couldn't really see what was going on, but she was adding and removing items from her bill, and paying with more than one card. The woman behind me started complaining that the lineup was slow. The woman paying was blonde, slim, in her early forties, had a cane, and her right foot was in a loafer-type shoe with no sock. I could see a huge bandage on the left side of her ankle, and lots of bruising, discolouration and swelling. Obviously, she'd suffered some sort of injury. She finally made her payment, but that was after having the cashier take out a bag of dog food. She then said, "I don't want to hold all these people up", and asked the cashier to leave the bag for a minute while she located another card, and said she'd pay after we checked out.
As Dave was bagging and the woman was hunting through her wallet, I asked the cashier how much the bag of dog food was, and when she said $32.99, I asked her to put it on my bill. She did, then passed the bag to the woman and told her to take it. Confused, the woman said no, but the cashier told her I'd paid for it. The woman didn't want to accept my gift, was clearly embarrassed, but eventually accepted. She looked right at me and said, "I feel weird". At that point, so did I! I just said, "I have a dog, too", and didn't make a big deal. She then said something that I couldn't hear, but I just pretended I could, nodded and smiled.
The woman behind me asked if the other woman's card "wasn't working". I said yes. She then started saying, "There are still kind people in the world!", the man behind her beamed at me, the cashier told me I was very kind, and I felt like crap! I didn't do this for the attention or the kudos, I just wanted to make sure that a dog got its supper, and that a woman who was having a hard time manoeuvring with a cane and heavy groceries could get out of the store as easily as possible.
I left, and avoided the woman who I could see loading the groceries and food into her trunk. Later on, I asked Dave what she had said in the store. She apparently was saying something like, "I think I've gone over my $200 daily limit on my debit card".
I wish I hadn't embarrassed her; I only wanted to help. She could probably technically afford to buy the dog food, but I think that if she had to juggle three separate debit and credit cards in order to pay for what wasn’t all that much food, there has to be some sort of issue there. I also wish I’d gone up to her at her car, and explained that I didn’t think she was poor, I thought she was hurting, and I just wanted her to get home and off her feet as quickly as possible. That I'd just come from the chiropodist because my feet hurt, and I saw that she was injured. Or something to that effect.
Anyway. If she can afford to, I
hope that one day she follows the advice of the woman behind me in line, who
yelled at her, "PAY IT FORWARD!" when the recipient was still
protesting.
No comments:
Post a Comment