I had an interesting ride home on the subway this week.
My car was packed. Lots of people standing. A young mother and her child in a stroller came on. She positioned herself by the door and hung on.
In no time flat her baby boy, no more than 2 years old, began bellowing.
She ignored him.
His voice got louder.
The mother looked down at him and just stared.
The child began to yell. Big goldfish tears ran down his cheeks.
Mom stood there motionless.
Tension was rising in the car.
The kid was screaming even louder.
Out from between people’s legs a little girl, dressed in a pink hat, emerged and stood in front of the boy. She looked up at the mother as if to say, “Aren’t you going to take care of this?” She held in her hand a large opened bag of Cheetos and offered it to the boy. 
Instantly he was quiet.
He shoved his arm into the bag, extracted a Cheetos, and began to chew on it.
The little girl disappeared.
Mom never said a word.
The subway car made it’s routine stops, people got off, the crowd thinned out, a seat became vacant and mom sat down.
The little girl appeared again and offered the boy some more Cheetos. He plunged his arm into the bag and retrieved another one.
Mom never said a word.
I went back to my book and when I looked up again, Mom and son had gotten off the subway.
I’m not going to comment on the mother. For all I know she wasn’t the mother, but a babysitter. Or if she was the mother, she was in a frightful state of mind. Probably numb from the struggles of life. And in her shoes I would have reacted in the same manner.
What did make an impact was how a simple gesture of kindness can affect a whole lot of people.
It also showed me how powerful a child can be in the midst of a tense-filled moment.
Calvin says, “If I had been there that little girl and I would have wolfed down that bag of Cheetos together, tossing the occasional one to that boy.”
Calvin & Bloggie 