Hello,
In these days of Covid, I find a general grumpiness taking hold of a lot of people.
Last week, I stopped into the local grocery store to pick up a couple of things, and as usual the folks at the grocery store were hard at work, as they have been throughout the onslaught of this virus. All of them wearing masks that I am sure are cumbersome and bothersome. All of the cashiers behind plexiglass shields that I am sure makes it difficult to communicate with their customers. All of them wiping their hands and counters over and over again with unmitigated repetition. All of them daily putting themselves in harm’s way to help people like me stay alive.
So, I haven’t been surprised when the workers at the grocery store are a little grumpy, and sometimes that has happened. I am not surprised if they seem a bit weary and worn out and are people of few words when they encounter me. I am not surprised when they are not delighted by my presence. Given all that they face, I know that I would probably be likewise.
But I was surprised this past week when I stopped to pick up a couple of things at the grocery store. After gathering what I needed, I proceeded my way to the checkout area. The “express” lane was long, so I looked to see if there was a shorter “normal” lane with folks that didn’t have overfilled grocery carts. I found one, and I stood on the green dots on the floor that kept me appropriately distant from those around me. I was third in line. As I waited my turn, I noticed something that took me by great surprise. The checkout person was vibrantly friendly and wonderfully engaging the people. When she greeted the person she was about to help, it was delightfully warm. When the older woman in front of me reached the checkout person, I heard the checkout person call the customer by name, and said, “Oh hello, Mable. How are you today?” She engaged in some endearing chit-chat with the customer, and when her checkout was complete, she said with an energetic wish, “Mable, you have a great day!”
When I reached the front of the line, she likewise warmly and delightfully greeted me, someone she had never met before. “Do you have a Giant Eagle card?”, she asked, not with an assembly line monotone but with a bounce in her voice.
“No, I don’t, but here’s my telephone number,” which I rattled off to her.
“Oh, Jerry. Good morning!”, she replied when my number unveiled my identity.
She chit chatted with me as she rang up my few items, and when she handed me my receipt, I said to her, “Thank you for your cheeriness. It is wonderful.”
She, with a lilt in her voice, “Well, I am trying.”
And then she said….., “My cat died this morning.”
The surprise of her words hit me in the face like cold water. “Oh, I am sorry,” I replied, “I had to put my dog down this winter, and boy was that hard.” And as I left her, I said, “Thanks, again, and take care.”
The saying is certainly true, “Be kind because you don’t know what battle someone is fighting.” I was wonderfully amazed at her cheeriness in the face of the never relenting shroud of this virus, but I was astonishingly amazed at her cheeriness towards me in the face of the loss of a beloved companion, just that morning. She didn’t know me. I had never met her before. I was merely a buyer of potato chips crossing her path that morning, and yet she treated me as something far more. She greeted me with joy that I had come to her checkout line. And she sent me away with a blessing of grace that made a dent in my life.
Thank you, Lord for the grace that that checkout person showed me and showered into my life. Lord, so fill me with your gracious love, that I, like she, might be able to overcome the battles of my days and make a dent of your joy, hope, peace, and love in those who cross my path. Amen.
Have a great week.
God’s grace and peace, (ggap)
Pastor Jerry Nuernberger
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