The Impact of Kindness

I awoke one morning at three a.m. to the impatient demands of my older sister for me to wake up and get ready to leave. I was fifteen years old, and she, my younger sister, and I had spent the previous week visiting our mother who had recently remarried and moved to another city that was a four hour drive from where we lived. My older sister, Tiffany, had to work later that day so it was necessary for us to leave unreasonably early, which required us to get moving at a time of morning that my teenage self believed to be a time no one should ever experience consciously.

Tiffany was nineteen and had her own car, so it was her responsibility to transport the three of us back home to our small home town while safely traveling through a large metropolitan city via the interstate. I'm not sure I even remember reaching the interstate because I opted to spend the trip in the back seat of the car sleeping. This would be one of the few times that I ever conceded the front seat to my younger sister, Leslie, who had decided to sleep as well, taking advantage of the reclining seat. The low frequency tone of the engine provided an ideal background noise for a sublime continuation to the sleep we had been prematurely interrupted from. The first hour of the journey was the process of arriving in the city that we would have to travel through and I was blissfully unaware of anything and everything until we were at least thirty miles on the other side of the city.

I heard a loud noise that woke me from my slumber and I had thought that maybe Tiffany had driven over something that was on the interstate. I didn't stir initially until she shouted at me to wake up. I arose from lying down in the back seat, and she frantically told me that we were being followed and that she believed that our pursuers had thrown something at the car. My first instinct was to tell her to speed up and lose them somehow. The only problem was, as Tiffany informed me, that the car wasn't handling normally and that she was afraid to drive any faster than she already was. The next thing that I knew, the car shifted to the right abruptly as Tiffany suddenly and without signaling, exited the interstate after slightly missing the exit and driving off the pavement. She was able to shake the car pursuing us as the drivers apparently valued their vehicle too much to navigate the bar ditch.

Relieved, Tiffany confirmed to me that the car was no longer behind us, but now that we were no longer distracted by that danger it was clear that she was driving on a flat tire. None of us had ever changed a flat before. I was more than willing to try but my sister was unconvinced that I would be able. Fortunately, there was a flashing marquee on the access road that seemed to be some type of establishment that was open for business before six a.m. Tiffany slowly eased the car down the access road and pulled into the parking lot of this combination truck stop and restaurant. She got out of the car and as I opened my door, she demanded that I stay inside while she looks for someone who can help. The two of us had always mixed about like oil and water, so naturally I argued and objected but she won this one. Now that the car had stopped, Leslie finally woke up and I gave her the shortened version of what she had missed while she slept. She was understandably upset and wanted to see Tiffany, but I told her that we were to wait until she returned.

After being inside for ten minutes or so, Tiffany returned with a man that was clearly an employee of the establishment. He was a man who serviced the large trucks that stopped there, and he began to inspect the tire that had gone completely flat. Tiffany told us to get out of the car and after we did, the three of us entered the restaurant area of the truck stop.

I was so glad that we were able to go inside. The outside air was so cold that morning, and Tiffany had left us inside the car without leaving the car running or the heater on. The only problem was that the restaurant was so large and open that any heat system that was present was ineffective, so while we waited for the man to return we were uncomfortably cold. It seemed like an eternity while we waited but eventually, the man returned with something small in his hand. When he got closer to us, I realized that he was holding a bullet. The man informed us that he had found it inside the tire and that it was clear that the car pursuing us had shot one of our tires.

At that moment, I was completely shocked. I suppose I had been a little bit sheltered in my younger life and was naive. Once the shock wore off, though, I was furious. Through discussion, it became clear that since Leslie and I were lying down asleep, the pursuers thought that Tiffany was traveling alone. When she told me to wake up and I sat up, they realized that she was not alone and thought twice about continuing pursuit. My heart began to harden as I pondered the events. We had done nothing wrong and were simply traveling on the interstate, minding our own business. Someone had a sinister motive for my sister and I had to face the reality that not everyone was motivated by goodness. As my heart hardened, I began to adopt the thought that possibly no one could be trusted, and that I should simply accept that most people are not good and that their intentions were to be feared.

The man was willing to change the tire for us even though Tiffany didn't have enough money to pay for it. He agreed to allow her to mail payment after we made it safely home. This was a time when cellular phones were not common to own and it was not possible to accept payment by card over phone or internet. As this was being discussed, the waitress brought three cups of hot cocoa to our table and explained that the elderly couple who were sitting a few tables away from us had bought them for us. As cold as it was, even inside the cafe, the hot cocoa was such a welcome surprise. I sipped on mine and felt the warmth move through my body in more ways than one. This kind couple made their way to our table with gentle smiles on their faces and asked if we were okay. They had heard our story and saw three kids on their own that were stranded, afraid, and had narrowly escaped what could have been a terrible fate. It was obvious that they were people of modest means that probably didn't have the ability to change our circumstance, but what they were able to do, they did freely and gladly.

It was just a few cups of hot cocoa. On the surface, it seemed like such a small and simple gesture of kindness. But for me, it was the turning point of what had been, at that time, one of the worst mornings of my life. It was certainly the scariest morning I had ever experienced in the fifteen years I had lived. What this couple did for us shined like a light in the middle of a vast darkness. It was the moment that I knew that everything was going to be okay. More than that, though, it served to counter balance the act of evil that had been perpetrated on us a few hours before and restored the belief in my heart that good honest people were still out there, that what we experienced on the road was the exception and not the standard.

All three of us thanked the couple and the man who changed our tire. We set out again to finish our journey and we arrived at home without any other major complications, other than arriving much later than we intended. Once I was home, life seemed to go on as everything was back to normal. Tiffany, Leslie, and I would discuss this morning several times over the next years and it was clear that it was something we would never forget. When either of them would relay the story to a friend or a relative, the focus was always on the possibility of the terrible things that could have transpired. While I acknowledge that possibility, that's not what stands out in my mind when I remember that morning. The man who changed our tire when we didn't have money to pay provided a practical and realistic solution to our problem, and I will always be grateful for that. However, it's the kind and generous couple, that could have turned a blind eye to us instead of showing us a small act of compassion, whose memory will always live on inside of me.