My mother had an old washing machine with the ringer on the top.? The gears were broken and she had to hold it in gear with a screwdriver while she fed the clothes through the rollers with the other hand. I can remember seeing her cry when clothes were all tangled up or got grease on them. I would dream of buying her a machine that wasn’t broken.

When I turned 16, I found a job in an old-fashioned hardware store. I actually got the job through the school counselor who listened to my plea to make some money so I could get my teeth fixed. The store sold just about everything that you could need around a home. From nuts and bolts to appliances, it was very well stocked. Many of their customers were contractors but lots of other people shopped for things they needed to do it themselves.

The owner and manager of the store was an older man who wore stiff collar shirts with a bow tie. He carried himself very erect and he was very direct when telling someone what to do, but I think he had a heart as big as a football.

I drove their old panel truck and made deliveries a couple times a week. The rest of the time I waited on customers or worked in the back room putting stove pipe together or glazing windows.? It was a great learning experience and the money was adequate.

I hadn’t worked there very long when I told the owner about my mom and her broken washing machine. He told me to take one of those new machines home and we would work out a payment plan. It was kind of funny that the payments were exactly the same amount as the raise that he gave me a couple weeks later. The washer I took home was probably the last one they made with those old rollers, but she was so happy that she cried when I brought it home.

One day I had an accident with the company truck.? I ran into the back of a great big Cadillac. It was driven by a kind elderly gentleman who helped me quit shaking long enough to exchange information. I was shaking again when I got back to the store.? The owner was standing by the counter and when I walked up he told me to turn around. I was puzzled and thought I was probably going to be fired. He came around the counter and reached up and gently nudged my rear end with his toe. When I looked back at him he had a big grin and announced that I had just been properly admonished.

The owner then asked me if I had any idea of who it was that I had run in to. He said that it was the Dean of the University of Washington. ?The Dean had called the store to report the accident. However, he had gone to great lengths to assure my boss that I was a very nice, courteous young man and he hoped this incident wouldn’t endanger my job. The boss assured me that I probably wasn’t as nice as the Dean claimed, but he was proud of the way I handled myself.

I guess that all of us can only hope that at some point in our lives we have treated someone with compassion and left them with the respect and memories such as the ones I have of those two gentlemen who were so understanding of a very young man.