Today in our competitive, angry world, I wonder if you would like to hear a simple story about kindness for a change. My sister Hazel liked this little story. She recounted this incident about an unusual response to what might have been an unpleasant night for two neighbors a long time ago.
When Mom and Dad were bringing up our large family, their ability to provide food and shelter was tested many times, especially through the winter. Yet through our family’s hard work, we always had enough… even in the hardest of months and the hardest of times.
Before we had a cellar, one of the ways Mom used to keep vegetables and fruit safe was to place them in a deep hole, dug below the frost line and covered with mounds of dirt, then topped with cane stalks. This bed was just inside the garden gate, not far from the back door to the house itself. It may have been common for other people to store food this way also, for it seemed to be known in the community that that was the place to look for a supply of food.
Sure enough, on this particular night a couple of people showed up, bringing with them an empty sack and a plan to help themselves. My parents and the rest of the family had already gone to bed when the farm dog started barking, bringing everybody awake. The dog had spotted two strangers at the edge of the garden. Dad and Mom were up quickly. Dad was ready to confront the thieves, but then he stopped, for he realized that he knew them. They were not men. They were boys. They were several miles from home, and I guess Dad assumed they must be hungry if they had come such a long way to steal food. He made a decision. He said, “Let’s just leave them alone. Let them take enough for a mess (meal) for their family.” So Dad waited, and the boys stayed a little while, then they left.
Today as I remember how proud Hazel was when she told me this story, I also feel proud. And yet I have a question which probably will never be answered. I wonder if the boys ever did find out that the food they thought they had stolen that night had actually been a gift freely given.
I believe this incident occurred when Hazel and our other sisters were very young themselves. Alline also told me recently how mom would store different kinds of food by burying it in the edge of the garden, even including canned goods, she said. It was Alline also who told me how Mom would top the bed off with sugar cane stalks because it would help to turn away the rain.