Y’all.
Lately I’ve been thinking about the helpers.
I've thought of the helpers many times since my husband John was diagnosed with brain cancer and died. Without the helpers, I'm wondering if this once capable and able-to-kick-ass-and-take-names woman would even be here any longer.
As a newly-minted widow I was crumpled up like a non-winning lotto ticket. I fell fast and messy, far and wide, like an avalanche.
Grief can be a state of mutable broken-ness. Broken on Tuesday, standing on Wednesday, dented on Thursday, fine on Friday, devastated on Saturday. That’s your calendar for a while.
You can't do it alone. Please don’t try. You need helpers.
Yet, wouldn’t most of us rather BE helpers than NEED helpers? Probably.
I know I would.
Yet how I do love the wonderful helpers. I owe them so much. I owe them everything, really.
Really. Everything.
Oh, dearest helpers. I sure wish I knew how to pay you back for all the kindness, non-judgement and sweet support you've shown, but most of you will never need me as I've needed you. (That's good, right?) So I endeavor to pass on your kindness wherever I can, in whatever ways I can, to those who do need a helper for a minute or a month.
On a cross-country drive in 2016 from New Mexico to Georgia, I stopped outside Trinidad, Colorado, at a well-attended gas station/convenience store located at the crossroads of a few hotels and restaurants and some outlying tiny-town type things. There was very little before this crossroads and little for long way after. This oasis of supply was always rather crowded with road trippers. I had stopped there a few times on past trips.
It was summer and it was hot. High desert hot. That ultra-still kind of heat that shimmers the landscape and sucks the moisture right out of your body.
In the blazing sun by a stop sign sat a man with backpack and a dog. He sat with his back against the sign post holding a piece of cardboard that read: "Anything you can spare. Please help."
He looked to be possibly in his 30s and didn't seem to be in any kind of bad shape, but then you never know someone's story. The dog looked fine, if too hot like the rest of us.
I drove past them on my way to get gas but on my way out I stopped. I stopped because I realized I had passed them by at first because they looked pretty intact.
Yet I know very well how looking intact can be deceiving.
Don’t we all know.
I rolled down my window and the man stood up. I handed him a $20 bill and said "Good luck." He replied with a simple "Thank you," and took the dogs leash and they walked off together. I lingered at the stop sign for a few seconds, a bit surprised to see them walking away. I had guessed he would go right into the convenience store, perhaps for some food or a cold drink.
My window was still down and I heard him say to the dog in a happy voice, "Maggie, we can get your medicine now."
Maggie looked up at him and wagged her tail, probably making the only breeze for 50 miles.
Y'all helpers. You did that.