"Hopeful"

“You?”

It happens.

And I need to get it “on record” before this odd sensation wears off.

So here we go.  (With a lighthearted step.)

Heading towards Groundwork Coffee Co., I notice that, lo and behold – “Searching” my thickening oeuvre you will find no other “lo and beholds” so you can count yourself lucky you were present for this one – okay, where was I?  oh yeah – I notice that, lo and behold, a slab of oncoming sidewalk, long in dangerous disrepair, had finally been fixed!

You know, standing on a board balanced precariously on a ball?  That’s how it felt, crossing that raised and rubbly terrain. 

And I mean for years!

Now, although still raised (over intruding tree roots), that one-time invitation to knee sprains and falling is smoothly “blacktopped” and safe. 

Well, Glory be!   (Likely also a ‘”first.”)   

Cut To:  Inside Groundwork Coffee Co., after I arrive.  (Duh.)

Having ordered my habitual Venice Blend “Pour-Over”, while awaiting its filtering “drip”, I head over to a “supply counter”, to secure a napkin and a lid.  (Or, as I grew up saying, “a serviette and a cover.”)

I reach out to the stack of napkins when out of the corner of my imperfect left eye I spot a dark-haired woman reaching as well, arguably sooner than I did. 

Salvaging my faux pas, I respectfully defer.  But the woman insists I go first, so I do.

Due to my lingering guilt at “jumping the queue”, or because I am on dehydrating allergy medicine, or both, I am fumblingly unable to take hold of the napkin, explaining,

“My fingers are dry.”

The woman immediately plucks up two napkins and hands them to me. Embarrassed but unsilent, I accurately observe,

“I beat you to the punch, but you helped me anyway.”

“Yeah-heh-heh-heh-heh?” she warmly chuckles. 

“It’s called ‘community’, right?”

“Community” from a stranger, in these self-serving times.

And I thought the paved sidewalk would be the shining high point of my walk!

Then, on my way home, another ray of humanitarian sunshine.

Two young women, heading my way.   As they pass, I hear one of them say,

“I mean I know he’s not perfect.”

Do you hear that?

She knows he’s not perfect.

And yet she’s giving him a chance!

Life.

It depends what you notice.

And normally,

I notice the other stuff.

Well at least this time, I notice,

I didn’t.