I've been wanting to get back into writing again lately, but didn't want to write a "hey, I'm back" post. I wanted to wait until I had something meaningful to write about. Last night, that blog post found me, as I'm sure, so did my angel.
After dinner, I decided to go grocery shopping, even though it is the last thing I want to do at 7pm. New Jersey was supposed to get some severe thunderstorms, but the sun was out and the sky was relatively clear. The clouds looked anything but threatening. So, I headed off to the store, list in hand. As I made it through the store, I kept looking out the window watching as the sky grew darker and more menacing. I knew I only had a handful of things left to buy and I had a week's worth of shopping done.
As I stood at the deli counter, I could start to hear thunder. My husband called me, very worried about the storm and I was out in it. Not to mention we still had to cart all that stuff up the stairs. I assured him I'd be fine and I only had a few things left to buy. A gentleman standing at the counter must have overheard my conversation and asked me, "what number do you have?". I replied saying 7 (they were on number 5). He proceeded to switch numbers with me saying, "you're husband seems worried and I have nowhere to be". I thanked him and told him how grateful I was because quite honestly, the storm was getting bad. He was an Italian guy, maybe in his mid forties. He wore gym shorts and a t-shirt and had salt and pepper hair. He looked like the type of guy that coached his son's little league team. He was through ordering before I finished and he was gone.
I ran and got the last of my list and went through the register, paid and bagged all my groceries. You could tell I just wanted to get out of there because my normally organized packing took a serious hit. I just wanted to get done and get home.
By this point, the ran was coming down so hard that the parking lot was flooding, it was very windy and the lightening was pretty vicious. I stood outside under the awning with a few other shoppers. I looked around and said out loud, "FML". We all giggled and I decided it was now or never.
Just as I reached the divide between the cement and the asphalt and just when I was about to get soaked, a car pulled up right in front of me with an umbrella hanging out the window. It was the man from the deli counter. He asked me where I was parked and I pointed to my truck just across the way.
He pulled away and I opened the umbrella and headed to the truck. I was a little nervous about holding an umbrella during a lightening storm, standing in a puddle. But something told me I'd be fine and not to be scared. I quickly loaded all my things into the truck and in the faith of paying it forward, I returned the cart to under the awning.
As I made it back to the truck, the man pulled up again. I folded his umbrella, shook it out and handed it to him through the window. I said, "you were like my angel tonight, thank you so much." He said, "just get home safe" and drove away.
It isn't often that you meet a total stranger that would do that much for another person and I feel truly blessed to have been touched by an angel last night. And even if this man wasn't really an angel, than at the very least my faith in the human race has been slightly restored.
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