I pay you! I pay it forward

So, having been loved on so much...I think it's time to share a love effort of my own! Love can be as big or as small as the tiniest effort. But a little more love adds up!

I'm in the field for work in Los Angeles. I'm driving to get my next client and I am currently in the company car alone. Having had a very stressful morning (and since I am currently hungry and therefore cranky), I begin to pray and repeat Bible verses to myself. This effectively calms me down, but it also causes me to be in my own little world. My window is rolled down because I find fresh air to be a more appropriate temperature than the fridgidity of the subzero AC.

Now I am humming to myself and I almost miss the little old lady standing at my window.

"Excuse me. You can help? You help me?"

I'm a little alarmed because the look of concern is etched so deeply in her face. The wrinkles have folded into themselves in a most ungraceful way and she is sweating.

"Help me? You can? I need to get to Fountain. Been here for 2 hour. I just need to get to Fountain. Bus never come. Is down street there. Please, you can help?"

I am ashamed to say that my initial reaction is suspicion. I look around her for a big bulky man waiting to jump into the car if I let her in and murder me. I see no man and I can only think of my grandmothers standing out here, wishing someone would help them get down the street.

What if nobody helped them? All she needs is a ride, Sarah. And if she does have a shank in her purse, at least you died trying to help somebody. Whoa, Sarah...that's a really weird thought. Well, it's how I feel, self...we should probably decide whether or not we're going to help her before this light turns green. What would Jesus do? Um...DUHHH!!!

So I move my purse (don't judge me...all my suspicion isn't gone yet!), and open the door.

"Oh goodness. Thank you thank you thank you thank you. I pay you. I pay!"

"No no, don't worry about it. I'd want someone to do the same for me."

I drive exactly two blocks (in the direction I was going anyway), as she sits breathing heavily and sweating in the passenger seat. She is possibly slightly afraid because she clutches her purse and looks straight ahead. (Turns out Fountain is a street! I thought she was looking for water!)

"Here. I live here. Thank you. I am so sorry to bother you. I could not walk no more. I wait two hours for bus and it never come. I pay you! I pay!"

"No! No need!"

"Please have good good day. You sure I no pay you? I pay you!"

"No thanks ma'am...God bless you" because I could think of nothing else to say.

She bows over and over again as she leaves the car. The burly murderer never shows up.

Sometimes love looks like driving 60 seconds thataway.