Random Gallant Blessing For Us

This is a story about two American Texans who just happened to cross paths at the Waffle House  in their hometown of La Marque, near Galveston.

Adrian Charpentier is a living, breathing specific specimen of the "Old White Man". He is 80-ish, stumbles and mumbles a lot. 

Evoni  Williams is an 18-year old African-American high school graduate who hasn't missed a day at work in the local Waffle House since she got her diploma.  She is saving every penny she earns for college education in business administration "no matter how long it takes..."

When Charpentier  struggled to his seat at her counter, Evoni  took his order and when she served him, she routinely asked if he needed anything else.

More to make conversation than anything else, the elderly Charpentier answered self-deprecatingly: "My hands don't work too good and people laugh at me stabbing  my meat instead of slicing it.."

Despite the rush around her, Evoni took her time preparing the plate with morsels... bites.

That's when someone took a photograph of the interaction between the two.  Television stations later uncovered some poor  security cam footage.

The important thing is that on social media, "viral" was too tame a word for the speed-of-light sharing of this simple tableau.

My first reaction to the story was  "What's the big deal ?   We have been cutting up and fixin' food nice old folks ever since I can remember... And now my sons  and grandsons and their wives cut away gristle  and such for my toothless pleasure.

Then I realized that the Twitter and Facebook millennials have never seen this sort of behavior before. For them and what I call The SWIFT Society, a random act of  kindness, like publishing the Truth, is revolutionary... Insurrection!! And here was a dark skinned woman exchanging down-home understanding in a public place in the year-of-our Trump, 2018!!!

Econi said: "I was not raised to bash anybody. I was raised to be kind and do good and spread blessings."

And here is the magnificent truth: Evonmi will MEVER change...no matter what.  I know because I have known her for all of my life and she is as much a part of me  as my pulse.

A lot of good things happened as the result of the publicity. 

Naturally the local mayor had to pontificate, and everybody said good words and shed honest tears. (The Shock of Recognition.)

The very intelligent leadership at Texas Southern University produced exactly the right and fitting miracle for Evoni---a $16,000 scholarship for her degree. And  Evoni is rapturously grateful.

BUT, she warned, she is not giving up her Waffle House  shift. NO Way !