Make their day with your kindness
The doorbell is ringing.
The man in the orange t-shirt is waiting with sweat rolling down the side of his face. He rings the bell again, no reply. He feels anxious. He picks up the phone and makes a call, he hears the engaged tone on the phone. He wonders what to do, he is getting nervous.
The door opens, a young girl walks out to grab her food parcel. She is talking to someone over the phone. She doesn’t look in the eye of the man who brought her food. She goes inside the house and closes the door. The job is done and the guy is returning to his bike. Suddenly, he hears a voice.
“Brother, wait a second”, it was the voice of the girl from inside the house.
The guy in the orange t-shirt looks at her. He could feel the scorching summer afternoon sun drain his energy. The girl is calling someone on the phone. The man is looking at her talking on the phone. He is waiting, wondering what’s happening. The girl looks at him and calls the the guy,
“The restaurant hasn’t packed tomato chutney with the parcel. I just dialed them and they’ve asked you to come collect and deliver it to me. Can you do it soon?”, she cuts the call and closes the door.
The bike started and the man had to ride 5 kilometres to grab the parcel for the lady and come back the distance to deliver it. He is annoyed but he has to do it, after all it is his job and he can’t be complaining about things. He is paying with his sweat and energy for someone’s mistake and he is not getting paid for it. Yes, why wouldn’t anyone be annoyed by it? After all, he is a human and not a robot to deliver work as commanded.
He comes to the girl’s place in 30 minutes. He rings the doorbell, no response. He dials the number,gets the engaged tone. He is waiting. He is looking down on the floor with tiredness. The girl opens the door.
“How long to wait brother?”, she says and grabs the pack from him. The door is closed and the guy is moving towards his bike. He looks at his phone anticipating an order, he gets an order and rushes to the hotel.
He goes to the counter to check if the food parcel is ready. He finds it isn’t ready yet and he needs to wait for sometime. The smell of the chicken rolled in the grill oven is teasing the bile juices, he could hear his stomach gruelling. ‘Just this one more order’, he tells himself.
He is excited to hear that his parcel is ready. He grabs the food, waits four signals, crosses two bridges and takes several turns in small lanes and finally reaches his destination. He drives in a way that would make his father unhappy if he saw it.
He sees a lady eagerly waiting near the gate. He takes the parcel to her and she smiles at him.
“Do you need some water or something?”, she asks
The guy nods for a ‘yes’ and she asks him to come wait in the shade as she brings him water. He could feel his cells revitalized when the chill water runs down his throat, ‘what an amazing feeling’, he feels to himself.
“Thanks for the food. I immediately needed it for my old mother”, the woman thanks him.
“No thanks mam. I’m just doing my job”, he says. Still wondering if he gets another order.
“So when do you have food if you are delivering in the lunch timings for people?”, the woman asks him.
“Well man, this lunch timing is vital for me. People are waiting for the food I bring them so I don’t waste time much. I have my food after the busy hours are over, I eat around 4 or 5’o clock, just grab a tea on the way and that’ll do”, he said with tired eyes.
“I see. Take care of yourself brother. Don’t spoil your health for extra ten or twenty rupees you make. You are more important than the job you do”, she said
“Yes thank you madam. It’s not about the money. You know food will be on your plate in the next 15 minutes, it’s because of people like me.
I know how stressful it is to wait for food. I deliver to people from all classes, people doing all sorts of work and that smile when they see the food is here is all I ran for”, he said with a smile on his face.
“Let me not take your valuable time. Go get some food. Take care brother”, she said.
He smiled and left.’People like you, make my day’, he thought to himself.
What’s a gift? A gift is something you offer someone which will not take away anything from you but make you ‘valuable’. A gift can be a box full of chocolates, a luxury product, a kiss on the cheek, a little smile or a small act of kindness. Most people we meet in our daily lives, people like the guy wearing an orange shirt that we meet in our daily lives strive to make our day better, do you think a token of money is all it takes or just a small act of kindness can be the best gift you can provide them. Be grateful for the people who do these little acts around you, make their day with your kindness.
~Hari~
