….just a blink of time in an ordinary day, but it made me happy anyway, so I’ll share it.
We were struck by a New Year’s Eve urge for Ben & Jerry’s, so we went to the closest Freddy’s to pick some up. On our way out, a dad was coming through the entrance slowly. He had his little boy perched on his shoulders, and his hand on top of his boy’s head for protection. The man’s knees were bent, and I could see he was nervous about coming through the entrance and konking his kid.
I said to him, “You’re gonna make it!”
“Have we got a little clearance then?” he asked.
“Yep, you’re good.”
“Nice,” he said, as he made it through the first door, past the shopping carts, and bent his knees again and faced the second door with more confidence. “Because if not, it could be bad news for us.”
And he went on into Fred Meyer, and I laughed and headed out to the car.
Portlanders are awesome. He responded to me as though it was perfectly ordinary for me to have concern for his kid. He was grateful for the info, trusted me, went on his merry way.
Not every city dweller is like that. A more predictable response from some of the places I’ve lived would have been, “Are YOU lookin’ at MY kid?! Mind your own beezwax and shove off!” Or, much more common: the butt-out-of-my-affairs glare.
Portland has a remarkably high percentage of really friendly people. It gives me warm fuzzies.
Conscious Engagement 