16 August 2012

Of chivalry and coffee-salesmen

I don't often drink coffee, seeing how I'm allergic to caffeine, but Matt does, and he and my mother both enjoy a particular roast called "Black Gold" from local coffee purveyor North Pole Coffee. Being artisanal roasts, their coffee tends to be a bit pricier, but after  this morning, I have one more reason to splurge every so often and support the company.

This morning was the first time Little Bear and I ventured out to run errands by ourselves without Matt around providing an extra pair of hands, and I was nervous about getting through the grocery store all in one piece. As I walked through the automatic doors into the grocery store entryway, the owner of North Pole Coffee was walking out carrying a stack of empty boxes, presumably from restocking. 

At least ten other people walked through the large doorway at the same time we did, but somehow, the coffeemeister noticed the exhausted young woman who stood there for a moment clutching a tiny baby and looking at the legion of shopping carts, wondering how she was going to get to the one with an infant seat attached, stuck as it was in the middle of the sea of normal carts.

He immediately set down his boxes, walked over with a smile, and moved the other carts out of the way so that he could fish out the infant-carrier cart for me. He smiled at Little Bear, said "congratulations," picked up his boxes, and left before I could properly thank him.

It blew me away. Such an act of kindness for a random stranger, when he was obviously busy working and probably had more deliveries to make: I haven't seen someone go that far out of their way to help a stranger since we moved here a year and a half ago. I am glad to be able to support a company owned by such a man!

1 comment:

  1. That is great!! Chivalry is not dead. I'm always touched by someone who goes out of their way to help out someone else, especially a new mother who probably has a million worries on her mind already without having to figure out how they're going to dig out a cart of open a door.

    I used to just put Andrew's car seat into the basket of the cart, but I couldn't fit as much in the cart then, and often something would roll under the car seat and after I loaded up the car I'd find it and have to go back inside and pay for it...such a process! I usually ended up just putting him in a baby carrier after I got tired of having to go back.

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