Today was a decent enough day. It was a beautiful day without a cloud in the sky. It started off normal enough. I went visiting teaching for my church with a good friend, Deanna. Visiting teaching is where two ladies (chosen by church officials to be partners) are assigned certain other ladies in the church to come once a month and visit them. We are usually assigned 3 ladies to check on their welfare and to see if they are doing okay or may need help with anything. We also leave them a spiritual thought. Well, Deanna picked me and my little boy, Braxton, who came along for the ride and we visited a lady named Jennifer. (We usually keep our visits to no more than a half an hour.) After a little bit Braxton was getting antsy. So after he and I got home, I went to use the phone, and…..lo and behold, our phone and internet service was disconnected due to non-payment. Oooops, I had let that one slip through the cracks. Next will be PGE, I am certain. So I went to the bank and pulled out the moolah, and of course there was a gentleman standing outside the phone company building asking me if I had a dollar for him to go buy some coffee. (Strangely enough he was already holding a cup of joe), but hey, I'm a decent hearted individual, so I emptied my coin tray (ashtray) into his hand after deeming he was harmless and from what I could understand may have been a little mentally retarded. I feel for those people. After I exited the phone company, he was waiting for me asked me for 3 more dollars. Now this was a situation where I barely have enough money to feed my own family, and giving money to strangers isn't usually my cup of tea….or joe for that matter, but I wanted to be a good example to my little boy, so I forked over a few more dollars, to which the man seemed very thankful. The guy even declared, "I'm not a bum!" And, "How can I re-pay you?" He was definitely feeble minded……so I just said, "Give me your best happy smile." Which he did, and he still had his teeth, rathered yellowed, mind you, but at least he didn't appear to be a meth user. And Estacada is not known to have beggars on the street corners. Quite unusual. Then I took my little boy to the corner store where in the parking lot happened to be an old man 'playing some neatly rhythmatic tunes' with two spoons from the back of his van with a tip jar. Braxton stared at this quite unusual sight for a bit and I reached into my pocket and pulled out a couple of loose coins and instructed Braxton to put the coins in the old fella's tip jar. Soon after, I rewarded my boy with a trip to the local park where we played for about an hour. T'was a beautiful sunny day and would have been perfect had I not locked my keys in the car. I called my hubby from a nearby coffe shop and asked him where the spare key was hidden on the underside of the truck and after getting pretty muddy, I found it and drove home. Ah, what a day full of 'adventure.'
