Thanksgiving is just around the corner, which means that we’re all crazy busy, me included. I’m busy thinking about when to pick up daughter Francesca from the train and how to smuggle her puppy onto Amtrak, then I’m deciding whether to make a turkey or tofu shaped like a turkey, and finally I have to go hunting for fresh cranberries, so I don’t have to serve canned sauce with its telltale dents. And with the rest of the holidays approaching, like everybody else, I’m busy worrying about the economy. Every day the news reports more layoffs and downturns, and that worries me more than canned cranberries. Banks and car companies get bailouts because they’re big, but none of us do, because we’re little.
It seems backwards.
Anyway my head was full of these thoughts the other afternoon, as I was hurrying in a downpour through the streets of New York City, there to take my author photo. I know that sounds glamorous, and it would be if I were ten pounds lighter and ten years younger, but take it from me, the best fiction in my books is the author photo.
But that’s not my point.
My point is that I was running down the street in a city I don’t know, with no umbrella in the pouring rain, thinking about Thanksgiving and the economy and so preoccupied that I couldn’t find the photographer’s studio, which was at number 98. I ran back and forth between numbers 96 and 100 and then between 94 and 102, but I couldn’t find 98 and I was drenched and late. Throngs of people hurried past me on the street, their umbrellas slanted against the rain, and just when I was about to freak, a voice behind me said:
“You look lost. Can I help you?”
I turned around, and standing there was an older man holding an umbrella and wearing a suit and tie. His hooded eyes looked genuinely concerned, so I answered: “I can’t find number 98.”
“Take my umbrella, and I’ll look.”
And before I could object, he put his umbrella in my hand, hustled off down the sidewalk, and disappeared into the crowd. He came back five minutes later, pointing. “It’s three doors down, out of order, after the loading dock.”
“Really?”
“Come, I’ll show you,” he said, guiding me to a glass building that read number 98, where I gave him back his umbrella.
“Thanks so much.”
“No problem, take care,” he said with a quick smile, and in the next second he joined the throng of umbrellas hurrying down the street.
Leaving me in the middle of the sidewalk, suddenly not minding the rain and feeling a warm rush of gratitude. For the first time in a long time, I stopped worrying about Thanksgiving and started feeling thankful.
And not thankful for the usual things, like good health and a lovely child. Not even thankful to the usual people, like my family and friends. Those people, I thank all the time. But this time, I felt thankful for a complete and total stranger, who went out of his way to help me.
In fact, I realized, I had gotten bailed out, after all.
And it wasn’t money that bailed me out, it was better than money. It was time, concern, and human kindness.
It reminded me of other people who have gone out of their way to bail me out, and I suddenly felt thankful for them, too. Because while it’s easy to look around and wonder why I’m not getting something that someone else gets, that encounter reminded me to be thankful for the many bailouts that come my way. I can recount them now, but I won’t. They’ll be part of my silent prayer of thanks over the turkey and/or tofu served with canned and/or fresh cranberry sauce, sitting with my lovely daughter across a dining room table, and sleeping underneath, several overweight dogs and one very tired puppy.
But you should know, right now, that among the people who bail me out are the people who read me.
You.
So thank you, very much.
And Happy Thanksgiving.