I was coming home along Highway 401 from Windsor a couple of weeks back. It was midnight and I pulled off at a truck stop at London to use the facilities. No sooner had I parked, than I saw a woman in her 30s wearing a long hippie dress walking my way. I thought she was heading for a van behind me but no, she wanted to talk to me. I rolled down my window part way.
I can’t recreate her story word for word but the gist was, she was terribly embarrassed. She pointed to an older little blue car and said she was completely out of gas and had no money. She was desperate to get back to Brantford because her grandmother had taken a massive heart attack that day and died. She thought if she could raise $15 or so she could buy enough gas to get home.
I hesitated briefly, told her I didn’t think I had any cash, then started searching through our parking change in the little cup by the armrest. I scooped up everything that was there, about $4, and reached out the window and put it into her hands. She was so grateful and I hurt my shoulder reaching behind me to pat myself on the back.
When she left my car, she walked away counting the change I had given her. Maybe she has her $15, I thought. She’ll back her little car up to the pumps and put some gas in.
Instead, she got in her car, backed up and took off, back to the 401.
I was a little shocked but for some reason, not angry. One of my first thoughts was that I had just been Donald Trumped. It is the sort of thing he would do without blinking an eye. I went into the truck stop and reported my adventure. An employee said she had called her manager about the woman who had been going up to all the diners in the restaurant there begging for change.
On the way home, I had two other reactions. One, I was grateful that I wasn’t the person who just stole four dollars from me. I am a flawed human being, but I wouldn’t do that.
My second, and more permanent conclusion, is that I want to be the guy who helps a woman get home to Brantford after her grandmother has died of a heart attack. I know there was no grandmother, no Brantford, no heart attack. But I can be selfish enough without always letting logic and cynicism help me to be mean.
So, she got four dollars to do whatever with.
And for my money, I got a story. And a feather to put in my cap. Some might say, my cap is a dunce’s hat. That is perfectly fine with me. I hope to always stay a naive farm boy who gets sucked in every time by the carnival barkers.
I always liked a good carnival.
©2018 Jim Hagarty
