Greetings everyone!🙌
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Holidays like this period we are currently, are a time to share love with those around us. I grew up in a culture where people would help the needy, whether by sharing food or visiting to make them feel blessed. Sadly, nowadays, this culture seems to have faded away. It's disheartening.
However I still try to keep it alive. I still play along with the culture even though it looks nearly insignificant in the end. But what matters is that I tried putting a smile on someone's face.
There's this papa, a close-door neighbor who's always scared to approach me for patronage (to give his clothes a good treat; laundry), because according to him, things are very costly. It's not that he gives his clothes to another laundry person, no, he doesn't.
I tried negotiating the price low so he could afford it, but no way... I wanted to start attending to him free of charge, but I know how things like that can escalate, and I didn't want that to happen.
Exactly the week before Christmas day, he approached me with a bag containing some clothes, which he gave to me to work on. I was totally surprised because that's the first of his type.
"Papa, what happened? The price is still as we talked. Do you now have money to foot the bills?" I jokingly said.
"Hahaha, I have a party, and I need to look good. Just do it, I'll squeeze out money for it." He responded.
We laughed over it, and I told him to go, and I'll let him know when I'm done. I don't know what happened; I had the conviction on a first thought to work on the clothes for him free of charge as a Christmas gift.
Thursday evening of that week, I took the clothes to him, and when he stretched out his hand to hand over me money, I snubbed and told him not to worry.
Guys! You need to see how his face brightened with happiness. It was as if he won a jackpot. He thanked me countless times and ended it with a prayer...
At a point based on the way he emphasized the prayers, I thought maybe he's drunk on alcohol, but no, he's very normal.
I don't know about you, but for me, there's an immeasurable joy that circulates my heart whenever I involves in a act that's sparking joy in anyone's life. The smile I saw on his face really made me feel good...like I was in heaven. The gladness was too much for me to the extent that I began to regret why I didn't do that for him before. But, my real instinct balanced it with; "It's good to be doing such, but when it becomes excess, they'll take it as an entitlement."
This time, it's not going to be this man again; it's going to be another customer who's not expecting it at all.
Thanks for reading.