Helping Others

At this time of the year there are many groups, people, organizations asking for donations, from the Salvation Army to your church, if you belong to one, to Spanky's Home for Wayward Elves. Several times in the last few days one of our local TV channels has been doing stories on the Pa family. They own a Chinese Buffet restaurant not far from here, in fact we ate there this past week. For the last several years they have produced a meal for homeless people in the area which is held in conjunction with a toy drive and clothing drive to help the less fortunate.

The Pa family is from Taiwan but obviously have a generous nature. Granted they are funded by donations and other businesses for this annual meal they cook and supply, except for this year. For some reason they are behind on donations this year, maybe the economy, maybe cynicism I know not. Last year they literally ran out of food, and there were according to the news reports one thousand people still waiting for a meal. They fed fifteen thousand!! There were still hungry people waiting to eat.

Keepers and I don't have a lot but we are making it. Keepers Korner is where we funnel most of our extra funds but tonight keepers asked if we could afford to help the Pa family, they needed donations to buy more food. So we wrote a check for $30, and drove over to the restaurant to give it to them. I let keepers take it in, praying they received a nice response. I was not let down.

When they came out they were smiling. They were greeted inside and pointed towards the check out desk. The restaurant was very busy, Saturday night and a popular restaurant at that I might add. Anyway, the fellow who pointed Keepers toward the checkout thought she was there for a carryout order, at the desk the lady picked up the carryout order but keepers said "no, we came here to give you a check to help with the food for the free meal tomorrow, we saw the news story". The check out lady, the hostess and a waitress all began and repeated "Thank You" over and over. Keepers smiled and returned to the car and me, so we could head back home.

On the way home the younger Keepers were teary eyed, they always want to help others, to drop some coins in the Salvation Army pot, or give a toy to the Toys For Tots drive, and we have in the past but usually very little. Tonight it was $30, not a lot to some, significant to others, a fortune to some. All we know is that maybe a few more people will be fed by the Pa family tomorrow thanks to that $30 and maybe , just maybe someone who was checking out after Keepers left, were able to leave an extra $10 or $20 and help feed a few more.

We can always hope.

peace and joy to each of you

john michael and keepers