Today’s post brought the news of the death over last weekend, 24th/25th June, of an old friend where we used to live. We met as supporters of The Children’s Society and worked together (she doing most of the work which I am sure she enjoyed hugely) for 25 years or more. She was a real good’un, the sort of person who makes society and churches tick, and makes them better in so far as any one person can.
She told us how, many years before we ever met, she and another lady took their youngest children off to the infant school at the beginning of a term, came home, sat on the back door step and said, “Now, what are we going to do ?” They decided that they would support the Church of England Children’s Society as it was called then, and, by gum, did they do so. Coffee mornings, raffles, Christmas Draws, you name it, they did it. How much money they raised directly, or indirectly I do not know, but the Society owes her and all like her – and there are many – a great debt of gratitude. The children, once taken to school were adults when we first met and must be in their 50s or 60s now, so she had a long track record. We wrote a card to the family, they were the ones who let us know, and got it in the post today.
Then off to the Pharmacy to collect a prescription and make other purchases. I was greeted by name, which was nice and strangely comforting, but also a little surprising because although I do go in fairly often and cannot be as regular a customer as some of their other folk, and would not expect them to know me all that well, let alone by name. But, let us be grateful for small mercies . . .
