The Mad Minstrel

When I was about thirteen, my mother and I were traveling across the country on a Greyhound bus. It was a long and arduous journey, but it was an affordable means of travel and it gave us some quality time together, which I loved.

Most travelers know that the key to a successful journey is budgeting effectively and for that trip my mom set aside a specific sum for each day.

So there we were on a four hour layover in Salt Lake City, sitting on the sidewalk, talking and going through the allotment for that day, when a passing woman slipped a twenty dollar bill in my mom’s hand and kept going.

At the time, I thought it was kind of funny. We weren’t homeless, we didn’t need it for our survival, and I didn’t understand why she did it. Looking back now, I see what she must’ve seen; we were a mother-daughter duo on a cross-country bus trip and while we weren’t needy, maybe she thought we needed it more than her.

Some people might be offended, and I understand that, but I think it was nice and I wish I could thank her.

Here’s another story from a few years ago, right around the time my girlfriend got her first wheelchair. We were out shopping and it (the chair) was still an adjustment but we were having a great day- laughing, joking, and aimlessly wondering around.

Somehow, we ended up in a store that had an entire back wall dedicated to racks and racks of the most beautiful boots and shoes you’d ever seen. I’ve never been one for lavish shoes- just give me a pair of Chuck’s and I’m happy- but my girlfriend has always eyed every pair of pointy-toed, heeled, intricate, death-trap looking shoes we’ve ever passed and that day was no different.

We snaked through the racks of shoes and she pet a few pairs, humming and musing on how desperately she wished she could wear them. Having the mildly inappropriate sense of humor that I do, I joked that it didn’t matter now, if she was going to spend her outings in a wheelchair, she could wear whatever shoes she wanted. She laughed and made some comment about me being funny or ridiculous and then we moved along to see what else they had to offer.

A few minutes later, a woman tapped me on my shoulder and when I spun around she stooped down to my girlfriend and slid a fifty dollar bill in her hand. She said “Honey, you get whatever shoes you want. It doesn’t matter if you’re walking in them, as long as they make you happy.”

Oh, that woman. I cannot even begin to thank her for what she did.

You see, laughing and joking was the best way we knew how to come to grips with our new reality- It’s a tried and true method and I stand by it to this day, but- that wonderful woman saw the truth behind our laughter and took some time out of her life to offer comfort to a total stranger.

Some days the pain of this world weighs so heavy that’s it’s hard to breathe. The media shouts so much negativity that it’s easy to forget it’s not all bad.

I’ll say it again… It’s not all bad.

Those wonderful people, and countless others like them, remind me that the world isn’t only what we see on the news, so I carry them with me. I wield the kindness of strangers and use it as a shield against the million and one horrible things there are to know in this world. I don’t always succeed- and I’m not gonna lie, sometimes I’m the jackass who cuts you off in traffic- but I keep trying and maybe, just maybe, someone is carrying my kindness around with them.

That would be pretty cool.

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