Dress a Child

A friend of mine at work sent out an e-mail the other day needing some Santa's Helpers to meet at the local K-Mart to help with Dress a Child. I thought about it, put the e-mail aside, and thought I would wait until the following morning to give myself time to think about it. Well, I decided that I should do it. The only reason I didn't want to do it is because it is so easy to sit back and not think about the children in this world who don't have very much. Most days I enjoy living in denial. I decided I needed to push myself out of my comfort zone and just go--yes I would have to miss sleeping in on Saturday to be at the local K-Mart at 7 a.m., but it was the least I could do. So, I got up early this morning and headed to K-Mart while the rest of the family slept. My friend Susan had parked right next to me, so we walked in together, found where we needed to be, and I got my name tag and waited for my child. I got a little boy named Tarig who was 10--totally outside of my comfort zone! I haven't been around 10 year-old boys for 8 years (since my twin nephews were 10)! Okay--away we go. We got our list, and I had heard that the shoe aisle was the craziest, so we got our shopping cart and headed straight to the shoe aisle to get that part overwith. Tarig was cute--light brown curly hair--kinda shaggy like the boys wear it these days (doesn't that make me sound old?) but cute. I could tell he was trying to be 'cool'. He wasn't very talkative at first, so I tried to joke around a little bit to lighten things up. He found some cool shoes that he liked, so we headed to the boys clothes--I had no idea where that was since I have no boys, so I had to ask somebody--and off we went. We found a shirt that came with a cool stocking hat, then we found some jeans that he liked because the belt was cool--then we went back to the shoes because we forgot snow boots--found those, then back to the boys section because he needed a coat. Oops! Okay so I'm new at this. We couldn't find a coat that he liked, and luckily his mom was nearby and said he was really picky about coats and didn't like them to be very thick. Well luckily we found a really nice black wool coat with quilted lining, and when he put it on, it looked so nice on him--I told him he looked handsome--his mom asked him if he wanted to check it out in the mirror first, and he said no, pointed at me, and said "she said it looked good, so I don't need a mirror". Too cute! Then he needed some underwear, and I felt so bad for him because I could tell he was a little embarrassed--I would have been when I was little shopping with a complete stranger for underwear! But, we found some, then found some under-shirts--tank tops--then some gloves. Then I found out that we could go over the $100 limit as long as we were okay with paying the extra, so we went back and got a few more t-shirts and then stood in line waiting to check out. I told him he could go stand by his mom if he wanted to, but he said he wanted to stay in line with me. Oh how sweet. We chatted about Britney Spears and how much he didn't like her and her fake hair (his words). We were in line for quite a while, chatting it up. We got all done, took him to where his mom and siblings were standing (his siblings and cousins got to shop as well), and his mom told him to give me a hug--oh boy that has got to be one of the best hugs ever. He squeezed me so tight--I nearly cried. His mom had tears in her eyes most of the morning. For trying to be so 'cool', he really warmed up to me and made my whole day--my whole holiday really. I will do this again in a heartbeat, no matter how hectic and crazy, this shows me what Christmas is all about. I usually pick and angel off one of the trees and buy gifts, but I have to admit it's much more fun interacting with a child and letting them pick out the clothes they want. I wish I would have gone back and bought him more things, but I was so caught up in the moment that I wasn't even thinking. I think I'll call his school and see if it's okay to deliver some packages for him there.

Thank you to my dear friend Susan for giving me this opportunity. You can sign me up for next year!