A warming experience

‘Oh you always come at a bad time’, grumbles the woman who answers the door. ‘Well, I suppose you’d better come in’. She adds ‘I’ve decided to give you £10 a month. What do I have to do?’ I hand her the form and try, ‘Sounds like you’ve been touched by what you read in the booklet’. ‘I told you I liked giving to charity’, she says shortly, not looking up. I decide that the best thing to do is to sit quietly. I can see her teenage son in the next room, playing on the computer, his feet on his desk, headphones on. Then her daughter comes into the living room in the shortest skirt I’ve ever seen and glittery tights. Her boyfriend is waiting at the door. When she’s gone, the women looks up, her face glowing and says ‘Doesn’t she look great’. I’m touched. What a lovely thing for a mother to say about her daughter, and I tell her so. She looks up from the form. ‘So is this your job ‘, she asks. I tell her that I’m one of five volunteers and that we all live together as a community. ‘Oh, that sounds wonderful’, she says. I tell her that our time is nearly at an end, and that I was crying yesterday in meditation, thinking of saying goodbye to everyone. I tell her about how we’ll all sit round the kitchen table tonight, sharing our experiences. ‘Oh, that must be so good to be able to do that’, she says wistfully, ‘so lovely to have people to go home to’. Her face has softened and she looks so pretty now. As I’m leaving I reach out to shake her hand. At the same time I realize that she’s moving to hug me. I smile and she kisses me on the cheek. ‘Take care’, she calls after me, ‘have a lovely evening’.