"The Hobo" by Susan Pearl

When I was a little girl, probably in the second or third grade, I was getting ready for school one morning.  It was a little after 7:00AM.  There was a very loud knock on the front door and mother went and answered the door. There stood a hobo.
The hobo said he was hungry and didn't have any food and asked if we could spare some food.  Mom told the hobo that she could not invite him into the house but if he waited on the front porch she would fix him a sack lunch.
Mother went to the kitchen and fixed him a couple of fried egg sandwiches and put them in a sack along with some fruit and a baked item.   As she walked through the living room going towards the front door she stopped and got her purse from the coat closet.  She took a one dollar bill out of her purse and put it into the sack and then folded the top of the sack to neatly close it.  She opened the front door and gave it to the hobo saying that she had put a dollar in the sack with the food and she wished him well.  She told that he thanked her and said, "May God bless this house".
I went to school that day but I can't remember one lesson from school that day but I remember the lesson my mother taught me.  It was over sixty years ago and I have remembered that lesson all of my life.
Right now we are in a pandemic setting with the coronavirus.  Schools are being closed, along with many other meeting places and gatherings are being cancelled.
There are so many who can learn a life long lesson by seeing how we treat others, by seeing how we respect the rules on behalf of others and for the good of all.  There are a lot of schools closed but there are a lot of responsible and thoughtful lessons to be taught and learned.
Then as today's children grow up they will recall the lifelong lesson they learned, not in school, but by watching the actions of others.  When we follow the rules and guidelines given during this time the children will remember if we abided with doing what we are being "asked to do"-and "asked not to do".  Maybe, sixty years from now someone will write about the lesson learned and remembered of the time when everyone pulled together and did what they were asked to do and made it through a very serious and critical time together.