Take Heed

So there we were—a group of about a dozen strangers—weighed down with backpacks, wrapped up in coats and mufflers and mittens, red-cheeked from the cold, and wishing—yay, even praying—that the next bus would quickly COME.

As everyone stood silently in his or her own little world of cold misery in the “shelter” that offered very little protection from the elements, down the sidewalk came yet another—and her intent was to pass us by. We all watched her come closer, her ears full of iPod, and as one, we all turned to watch her go.

When she was directly in front of us, however, the ice that mere seconds before had been lying in a benign state upon the sidewalk suddenly became a Force to be reckoned with. And she slipped in a manner that abruptly jolted her from her self-aborbed world of iPod-dom. She did not quite fall, but it was comical nonetheless. And the twelve or so strangers she had intended to ignore suddenly became part of the picture. Her expression was Priceless, and as could be expected, she left our world considerably brighter than when she had entered it.

And when she had gone, the gentleman to my right voiced what everyone else was thinking. “What an embarrassing place to wipe out!”

Then we all laughed.

But we all took heed, lest we too, should fall.