PAYING IT FORWARD

I love hospital food and since I had an appt.

in Thibodaux, I decide to eat lunch at Thibodaux Regional.

While there  I run into a dear friend, Claire.

My family will never forget her help and her suggestion

on Mom's last hospital stay to get St. Joseph Hospice 

for her care. We knew she was dying and going with this 

hospice was exactly what she and our family needed.

I will always be thankful to Claire for her time and

her suggestion. She would say this was a small thing,

My family would beg to differ.

We are in line to check out and we greet each other 

with a kiss on the cheek and the question of how the families were.

We are bayou gals, it's the way we say hi.

We did not speak of the loss of my Mom or who

thankful I was to her. I had sent her a card to explain

this last year but I know we were both thinking of it.

We separate, he to eat with friends, I to eat and journal.

It is almost a year to the day when Claire helped my

family. I am filled with thoughts of "paying if forward"

We never know how good deeds to others will

affect us later in life.

Claire's dad was my English teacher in 7th grade.

He was quiet but challenged us to do our best.

I would get so frustrated because I just could

not make the grade I wanted in that class.

He was so respected as a teacher and I have to owe

my love of reading and writing partly to him.

Grammer is very important to me and he helped in

instilling that. 

When I became a nurse, there were many times

he was ill and I was his nurse. He was still a man of few words

so you never really knew how he felt having a student

now caring for him. I found out in the little things he did.

Like one Sunday, Baby Boy was a baby and we and Mom

were eating at Randolph's. So was he and his wife, Claire's mom.

He came to me and handed a ten dollar bill to BB saying

he knew I could not take "tips" but this was for my baby.

I was so touched. Many times since then His wife,

whenever she sees me, will share how much he loved

when I was his nurse, would even ask if I was coming to work.

Things I did not know.

He died many years ago but his wife still reminds me

of my caring attitude to her husband and how much he loved me.

This was always honorable and yet, so long later it is his 

own daughter, Claire who pays my family back in the way

of helping our own Mommy.

Pay it forward, each time you can,

you never know when it will be reciprocated.