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People Will Surprise You

Today I needed to go pick up something from my boss's house, and he asked if I would bring a bunch of books from his office for him to pack up. I didn't mind at all, but figured this would go better with a cart or dolly. I got a cart, loaded it up, and wheeled it across the Wardlaw courtyard.

Sounds genius, right? Not so much. With every bump, at least 1 book fell, and so I kept having to stop and pick something up. I felt ridiculous. There was a girl in the courtyard talking on her cellphone, a bunch of academic types walking all around me, and no one even looked at me with sympathy. I get as far as I can go, to the edge of the curb, about 20 feet from my car. While trying to pick up a stack of books, things started to slide and basically almost all of them hit the ground.

there were quite a few people on the nearby sidewalk, all of them just walking by and sort of gawking at me. Finally, two men pass by and asked me if I need help, and not only do they stop the imminent collapse, but they help me make multiple trips from the cart to my car, loading up the books. These men didn't appear to be students, although they may have been university employees, but based on their dress, probably not professors. Basically they were the kind of people that the students and faculty sort of glance over on a regular basis. They make this place work, and today, when everyone else was just walking by, they stopped to help me.

That just kind of bowled me over.

Comments

Missy said…
i've made the mistake with books on a cart on the campus before. and felt like a fool. a fool with books falling all over the place.
July 1, 2008 at 5:19 PM
Jenice said…
I would have helped:)
July 2, 2008 at 11:30 AM
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