Mark Weinreb: Thankful to witness a good deed done at the grocery store

To The Daily Sun,

With all the recent divisiveness in our community following the elections, I would like to tell readers about a heartwarming event that I witnessed the other day.

I was working as a food delivery driver waiting in a cashier’s line at a local supermarket. The woman ahead of me was beginning to try to pay for her $140 worth of groceries that had just been rung up. In her hand, she carried a small plastic envelope that contained different means of payment including checks, credit, and food stamp cards.

The customer had started writing out a check but put it back in the plastic envelope. Next, she took out a food stamp card that was not recognized by the checkout machine.

She put that card back and took out a different food stamp card. She inserted the card into the machine, and it asked for the 4-numbered PIN. The customer became flustered, finally typed in a PIN which the checkout machine did not recognize. By this time, a more affluent appearing woman behind me started to put her groceries on the conveyor belt.

At that moment, the woman with the groceries behind me told the woman ahead of me, “Let me pay for your groceries.” Before the customer, could say “no,” the woman said, “I insist, it will make me feel better,” and placed her credit card into the checkout machine to pay for the other woman’s groceries (it did not appear that they knew each other prior to this event).

Her credit card worked, the cashier packed up the other woman’s groceries and she left the store.

A stranger offered and paid for another woman’s valuable groceries. What a mitzvah (Yiddish for “Good deed”) indeed.

Mark Weinreb

Laconia