How Do We Teach Our Children Not to Be Afraid

Yesterday I got a phone call out of the blue from a man who I had not heard from for at least ten years. He and his then wife used to do some work around my house. They were a young couple from the country who were very honest, hard working, but not always reliable. They had two young boys and I tried to help them as much as I could, but after giving them many breaks I finally had to tell them I no longer had work for them after one too many let downs.

I had not seen them or thought about them until oddly about two weeks ago I ran across their names in my contact list and I wondered what had ever happened to them. Funny how sometimes I find my self-thinking about someone and suddenly they appear in my life.

I don’t usually answer my home phone anymore, but for some reason when it rang yesterday afternoon I picked it up without looking at the number calling. It was the man, who I will call S. His voice was immediately recognizable to me, but a little weaker. He apologized for calling telling me that he was at a very bad place in his life and just did not know who else to call.

I knew it had to be true that things were very bad for him, because I had been a very tough employer, never missing an opportunity to give him a lesson on how to be a better employee. He explained that his wife had left him three years ago, and he was now homeless and was looking for work.

I honestly did not have any work for him to do since my current yardmen were out in the garden at that very moment and my house was perfectly clean. But I kept talking with him. I asked him how long he had been homeless, if he had a car or a phone and if he had gone to the Durham Rescue Mission? He said he had recently been attacked and was stabbed 17 times. I told him I had not work for him, but I would give him some money.

While I waited for him to arrive with a friend who would give him a ride I asked Carter if she remembered him and his wife since they had worked here from the time she was born until she was about six. She had no memory of them, but got a worried look on her face. I told her there was nothing to be afraid of. I was not letting him in the house, but would talk with him in the driveway. I tried to explain to her that it had to be very bad after all these years for him to call me and I just could not ignore his true need. I also knew that if I got a chance to see him face-to-face I could encourage him to go and get help.

He was not a drinker or a drug addict, just someone who tried to take the easy way out. That almost always catches up with a person. When S. arrived I was out in the driveway. He got out of the car and shook my hand. The woman with him also got out and introduced herself to me and shook my hand, then got back in the car. He was thin and I could see the cuts from the stabbing. I talked frankly with S about where his life was going.

I had written the phone number of the Rescue Mission down on a piece of paper, which I took out of my pocket. I gave it to him and said that I was not a plan on how to turn his life around and that he needed to get help from people who were professionals at this. Inside the car, the woman was nodding her head in agreement. S said that he never forgot my talking squarely to him and told me about a time I told him, “Never do something in the daytime, that will cause you not to be able to sleep at night.” I don’t remember saying that, but it sounds like me.

He said he was ready to go get help. I reached in my pocket and gave him the cash I had on hand. I told him that he did not have to pay me back, but he had to go get help. He thanked me and told me he would eat that night. I told him to get something healthy. He got in the car and they waived as they drove off.

I came in the house and I called down to Carter that he had come and gone. She came upstairs sobbing. “I was afraid,” she said. I told her that he was not scary and it felt like the right thing to do. We talked for a while and I laughed when she told me she had been huddling in her room with her toy musket from Bennett farms texting with her Daddy who told her, “Your Mom has got this, don’t worry.”

I reminded Carter that people are mostly good and if we treat everyone with dignity bad things usually don’t happen. I want my child to learn to be smart and not put herself in harms way, but still have compassion and learn to pay it forward. These are hard lessons to teach. I did ask her what she was planning on doing with her toy musket.