Tom Gillispie: 2015

Saturday, December 26, 2015

Good Samaritan at the post office

I went to the post office the other day to mail a heavy box for my wife Holly, and a kind man opened the door for me. He noticed that I was struggling using one arm — I walk with a cane — so he carried the box into the mailing area and held it until a spot came open up front.

I thanked him, and he went on.

But that's not the end of the story. He was talking on a cell phone when I went back out into the lobby. He looked at my Buckeyes sweatshirt, and told the person on the other end of the line that a Tar Heels fan in disguise was coming at him.

He opened the door for me, and we wished each other season's greetings.

Sadly, I didn't get a photo.

EARLY HAPPY NEW YEAR, GOOD SAMARITAN...

Here's your early Christmas card.

I found another Good Samaritan today (May 3, 2016). As I said earlier, I use a cane. I was about to push my shopping cart to the assigned area, and a man was pushing his cart past me. He said he'd take it, and he pushed it while pushing his cart full of groceries.

Fortunately, the cart area was on his way. And I was grateful.

I encountered two more Good Samaritans recently when I was taking cans and bottles to a recycle bin at nearby Covington Park. They were attending children in the play area at the park, but they came out to help me. When I came back with more recyclables, the man came back to help again.

That sort of thing happens now and then, and I'm always extremely thankful.

EMAIL: tgilli52@gmail.com TWITTER: EDITORatWORK.

More blog entries by Tom Gillispie

• Resume for a writer and editor

• An editor's views on powerful writing

• Advice for be and would-be novelists

• Links to TG's stories online

• Favorite quotes

• What I do when I'm editing

Anecdotes by Tom Gillispie

• Wipeout at Death Valley

• Days with rainbows

• A desperate writer working in the dark

• Yer outta there!

EDITOR@WORK blog entries

• You really DO need an editor

• Reminders for would-be novelists

• What I do when I'm editing

• What I charge (it's a deal) and what I edit

• Slogging through the Internet

• J-school: More eyes on your stories

• J-school: Go out and learn

• Rookie mistakes for magazine writers

Entries from The Dog Blog

• Katie cried

• Growl and pull

• 13-plus years with my dog Lady

• ... said the spider to ...

• The Dog Diary (2014)

• YIP! YIP! The stereo-sound huskies

• What Lady and Michael Jackson had in common

Blog entries from The Auto Racing Journal

• Angel in Black: Remembering Dale Earnhardt Sr.

(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)

• Then Junior Said to Jeff...

(the book of great NASCAR stories)

• My best day as a sports writer

• Jeff Gordon's milk toast to Dale Earnhardt

• Wayne Auton: A life in racing

Thursday, November 12, 2015

OUR FUZZY LADY LIKED COLD WEATHER

I had a real scare tonight, although some people might say I was being silly.

First, our dog Lady drank a ton of water, lapping it over and over and over and... It seemed like her drinking lasted for several minutes.

Then she ignored the food I'd given her and laid down on the floor in the living room. Finally, she got up and went downstairs. Presumably, I figured, she'd go outside through the dog door and do her business.

But for more than two hours, she didn't come back upstairs, and I got worried. What was wrong with her?

When my wife got up in the middle of the night, I told her about Lady, and we both went downstairs to look for her. I was afraid of what we'd find, since Lady IS a 15-year-old pooch.

I opened the basement door, and Lady looked up at us innocently. It was like, "What's up? What's going on? Why are you both up?" She had just been enjoying the cool night air.

No, I didn't feel like a fool. I felt major relief.

She's lying beside my foot now and breathing heavily in sleep.

And I'm just happy she's still with us.

UPDATE: I'm not happy anymore. Lady passed on Sept. 17, 2016, about 10 months after I posted about my worry.