Friday, January 29, 2010

picking up the pieces

something really cool happened last friday night as i was headed home for the weekend, and i thought it was such a nice way to enter a few days off that i waited all week to share it with you, my wonderful readers.

there was a lot of activity in the crosswalk right outside grand central station - not unusual, but just enough of a flurry to catch my attention. and what i saw made me feel warm all over. a bike messenger had been knocked over and lost hold of his bag, which was apparently full of thousands of pieces of paper, and they were blowing all over the place - some were already several blocks away. my heart immediately sunk, realizing there was no way he'd recover them all. i wanted to cry for him. and for everyone and everything, because it was that kind of mood i was in, as you might remember.

but there in the crosswalk in midtown manhattan in rush hour on a friday night, a dozen passersby were running around picking up the pieces. literally.

and it hit me like a ton of bricks - unsink your heart and get moving. i joined the passersby, and i picked up the pieces i could catch up to, and the messenger's face as each person handed him the windblown, crumpled slips of paper spoke volumes.

some people would say "only in new york," but i disagree - i think people everywhere are good and kind and giving. now the bike messenger being knocked over by a rushing pedestrian? THAT might be only in new york

we're all in this together.

5 comments:

Quizzie said...

:)

krillz said...

i am a messenger, and i appreciate this. =)

Debbie said...

Ok I have another, my daughter lives in Manhattan and I in California. anyway she left her wallet in a gypsy cab on friday night, arghh. You know the drill cancel, cancel cancel. Saturday she got a call from Citibank that the cab driver was trying to find her to give the wallet back, the man from Citibank after giving her the cabbies phone number said, "see there are still good people in this world."
very happy ending

Maria said...

what a nice story, thank you for sharing. it made my heart smile.

carla rothberg said...

thanks everyone. it makes me very happy that stories like this make others feel good too.

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