My girl Flicka and I walked two blocks to the Triangle Garden, a sliver of earth in the middle of traffic, to lend a hand. The little section of ground was something pretty—or it would be soon, anyway—in a part of town that needed beauty like it needed air. We stepped onto the garden’s soil, and Debbie, the coordinator, looked up from her shoveling, her face splitting into a smile.
“Ah, you’re here to help,” she said. She set the shovel aside and handed me a couple of six-packs of petunias, nodding toward one corner of the community garden. “Pop these in there, if you would.”
I took a trowel, sauntered past a volunteer who heaved stone slabs into place for a garden path, and kneeled where Debbie had indicated. Cars rolled by on all sides. Some drivers honked, flashing thumbs-up signs to encourage us. I dug twelve holes—one for each of the plants—in the shape of a circle.
“Nice, Mom,” Flicka said, handing me the first petunia.
I patted each of the flowers into the ground and stood up, assessing my finished task. “Wow. From down there, I thought I did an amazing job.” I wrinkled my nose at the lopsided circle. “Looks like the work of a three year old.” Flicka laughed.
A woman wandered over to the garden from across the street, blurting out commands to the five little boys skipping along next to her. She approached me.
“I’m Mona,” she said.
I introduced myself and my girl. The boys scampered in the dirt, and Debbie gave them jobs to do: pull weeds, water new flowers, pick out rocks. She strode over to where we were visiting with Mona.
“Did you hear about the stabbing over there a month ago?” Debbie said to me, thumbing in the direction of the convenience store a block away. “It was Mona’s husband who was hurt.”
“Oh no,” I said to Mona. “Is he okay?”
“He’s better now.”
Debbie strode back to the other side and resumed her work. The little boys wrestled over the hose, one of them tumbling to the ground, pulling another one with him. Mona hollered at them to behave or else.
I nodded toward the kids. “Are they all yours?”
“Just those two.”
Debbie walked to her house and returned a minute later with a box. She doled out popsicles to the boys for all their hard work. Flicka and I dug, weeded, and raked around the garden as Mona shadowed us.
“So, you do a lot of projects in the neighborhood?” Mona said.
I shrugged. “I do what I can, I guess.”
“I don’t work, so I have time if you ever need help.”
I smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Our shift ended, and Mona and I exchanged phone numbers. Flicka and I brushed ourselves off, said our goodbyes to our fledgling plants and new friends, and strolled back home.
Mona tried calling the next week, but I was driving in thick traffic and didn’t hear my phone. No message. The day after, she phoned again, but I was at a conference and couldn’t answer. Again, no message. As I was arriving home at ten o’clock that Friday night, my phone rang a third time.
I clicked it on. “Hey, Mona.”
Her voice was muffled, her words halting. Was she crying? “Mona? I can’t hear you.”
“I’m not okay,” she said, sniffling on the other end of the line.
“What’s going on?”
“My little boy needs medicine tonight.”
She explained one of her boys, Jules, had asthma and needed his meds, but she was at the pharmacy and they were charging her $46.37 for his prescription—$46.37 more than she had.
“Do you have forty dollars I could borrow just tonight?” she said.
“That’s not enough, Mona. You just said you need $46.37.”
“I bet they’d give it to me if I had that much. I’ll pay you back in the morning when the bank opens.”
My mind swirled back to Husband’s and my honeymoon twenty-six years earlier. As we walked along a sidewalk in Winnipeg, a man called out to us. He sat on a heap of old blankets, a shopping cart his only companion. We listened to the man’s story. I narrowed my eyes. Before we walked away, Husband handed him a twenty-dollar bill. My mouth sagged open.
“Twenty dollars? Why would you give him that much?” I said. “You know what he’s gonna buy with it.”
“Yeah, maybe. Maybe not, though.”
Over the years, I had never given money to the homeless. No matter how moving the story, I waved away the requests. They were in pain, yes, but their stories were usually fabrications, weren’t they? A snack, water, or kind words? That I could give. Cash? Never.
But something about Mona’s story nudged me. Something swayed my resolve and ignited my compassion.
“I’ll see what I have,” I said. “You can come over and get it.”
My three girls watched me as I ended the call. I filled them in on Mona’s story.
“I think I should give her the money,” I said. “I never do this because I know better. But something’s different this time.”
“Then do it,” Flicka said. The other two agreed.
Ten minutes later, I opened the screen door to Mona.
“This means everything to me,” she said, stepping onto my porch. Tears had left trails down her face.
I handed her the cash. “Can I pray for you—for your little guy who’s so sick?”
She nodded.
I put a hand on her shoulder and offered up Jules. I covered her too.
When I finished, her eyes were wide. “You go to church?”
“Yeah.”
“Can I go with you on Sunday?”
“Sure, Mona.”
“I don’t have a car, though.”
“I’ll pick you up.”
We made plans for church on Sunday, and she pulled me into a hug.
“I don’t have friends, either.” Her voice was a whisper now. “So if you wanna hang out—”
Before she left, Mona asked when I would be around the next day, so she could pay me back. I told her. She headed to the waiting vehicle out front, jumped into the passenger’s side, and waved as she rode away.
No word from Mona the next day. But she texted on Sunday morning. No, she wouldn’t be going to church with us after all. Her kids’ father’s mom was in the hospital and she’d be with her all day.
Since she had promised to pay me back, I sent another text: When you get home, let me know and I’ll swing over to pick up the money.
Okay, I’ll call you later, she said.
Three months passed. No more messages from Mona. No more requests for rides to church. No more talk of loneliness. No more promises to pay back the money.
No messages at all.
“Remember how you gave that homeless guy money on our honeymoon?” I said to Husband.
“And you weren’t happy about it?” he said.
I pursed my lips. “I did the same thing with Mona. Got sucked in, believed her, gave her money. She played me.”
“Maybe," he said. "Or maybe not."
What had made me give cash to an almost stranger when I never did that kind of thing? What had changed in me the night Mona called? The money was long gone, but maybe I was meant to rest a hand on her shoulder and believe her. Maybe I was meant to give her up, handing her and her boy over into better care. And that prayer? It still wafted from a beautiful bowl in heaven, a fragrant forever offering.
And maybe that was everything.
*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.