Incredible Acts of Kindness

The woman stops and rolls down her car window. Oh no, what now, I think.
'Do you want my car park ticket? It's got a couple of hours left.' I accept, graciously. This is the second time this has happened to me. The first time was in a dark multi-storey, with heavy, low ceilings. I was alone. A man ran towards me, his hand raised. I froze. 'Take my ticket,' he panted, 'I've paid for too many hours.'
I have experienced many of these small, inexplicable acts of kindness, particularly from women when my children were small. The passenger on the train who fetched drinks for us when I couldn't leave three children alone and go to the buffet, the strangers who helped me on and off buses, the people who returned dropped toys and the woman who found and looked after a child I had lost at the American Adventure Theme Park. The most amazing example I witnessed was on a bus in Manchester and it followed a completely explicable act of cruelty. I wrote a poem about this for the recent Big Issue poetry competition. Needless to say it didn't win but here it is anyway:

Manchester Heroine

I am impatient,
with a driver who speaks no English,
with a man who eats a burger,
with the boy whose ipod whistles.
I am impatient when the bus halts,
too long.

A man tries to buy a ticket from
our driver, who speaks no English.
We wait, stilled,
hit by invective, then silence.
The driver cannot move.
He is diminished.

A woman stands, walks to the front,
touches his arm, soothes with words.
He was drunk.
It's not your fault.
Take your time.
We can wait.

She apologises for Manchester,
for us, the passengers on this bus,
the number 43 for West Didsbury
and Northenden. We smile, proud.
No longer impatient.
Not now.

I wish I'd had the courage to be that woman.