I take the train into work every morning from a train station near my house. I can get to the station quite easily as there is an alley way at the back of the station which provides a great short cut. In the summer, when it’s hot, I always try to rush through it because it can get quite smelly sometimes. (I think the heat makes all the rubbish that people throw in the alley way smell bad.) Today was one of those days that I was trying to rush through as usual when something made me stop for a moment. I saw the most unexpected and beautiful act by a frail old woman walking ahead of me.
The old woman was quite short and thin, she was Asian and she had white hair. I remember that she was wearing a bright orange jacket and she was walking with the help of a white cane. She was walking slowly as each step took some effort. I hadn’t particularly noticed her at first, until she stopped near a garbage bin.
She slowly laid her walking cane against the garbage bin and then leaned on it with her right hand. Then she bent down and reached for the garbage, she clearly found it difficult and it took her a while. She picked up some garbage off the ground with her left hand and slowly straightened herself up again, all the while using the garbage bin to support herself. She threw the garbage inside the bin, dusted her trousers off and then reached for her walking cane again. She then slowly straightened herself up and carried on walking. It all took her a good deal of effort.
There is so much garbage in the alley way and no one ever does anything about it. I was blown away to see this amazing old woman make such an immense effort to keep even a small part of it clean! I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that all day.
I want to acknowledge that wonderful old woman so I have decided to pick up garbage off the floor wherever I can from now on and put it in a garbage bin. I hope I can pay forward some of her kindness and hopefully people will be inspired, like I was, to do the same.
