next to the road. The blistering
noonday sun beat down on them
without mercy.
The man held up a cardboard
sign which read, "Will Work for
Food." The woman stood
next to him. She just stared at the cars
stopped at the red light.
The child, probably about two years old, sat
on the grass holding a
one-armed doll. I noticed all this in the thirty
seconds it took for the
traffic light to change to green.
I wanted so desperately
to give them a few dollars, but if I did
that, there wouldn 't be
enough left to buy the milk and bread. Four
dollars will only go so
far. As the light changed, I took one last
glance at the three of
them and sped off feeling both guilty (for not
helping them) and sad (because
I didn 't have enough money
to share
with them).
As I kept driving, I couldn 't
get the picture of the three of them
out of my mind. The sad,
haunting eyes of the young man and his
family stayed with me for
about a mile. I could take it no longer. I
felt their pain and had
to do something about it. I turned around and
drove back to where I had
last seen them.
I pulled up close to them
and handed the man two of my four
dollars. There were tears
in his eyes as he thanked me. I smiled and
drove on to the supermarket.
Perhaps both milk and bread would be
on sale, I thought. And
what if I only got milk alone, or just the
bread? Well, it would have
to do.
I pulled into the parking
lot, still thinking about the whole
incident, yet feeling good
about what I had done. As I stepped out of
the car, my foot slid on
something on the pavement. There by my