In Such Poor Health I Was Unable to Walk When a Man Virtually Carried Me to a Bathroom.
Back when I was 19 years old, my regular journey to work involved an express bus. It was perpetually full and invariably became completely full once I got on.
During a certain commute, I was feeling quite nauseous as the bus swayed around each corner. I repeatedly told myself to hold on just a little longer so the bus could reached where I needed to get off, so I could then sprint quickly for the nearest public restroom to be sick.
We were coming down the road leading to the stop when I realised I was unable to last. In an instant, it was like a fog descended upon me. My vision turned hazy and muffled; similar to when one cut the sound. I said to myself, “I will lose consciousness”.
Thankfully, I was positioned near the front on the bus, so I took several steps to ask the driver and asked the driver to open the doors, telling him I needed to get ill. The driver opened the bus doors and I stumbled out out onto the street.
I was resolved to not get sick in view of a busy multi-lane road, so I gathered myself and endeavored to stumble across to the park on the other side, where I believed it would allow me to find some privacy among some shrubs to throw up. Yet I likely lost consciousness. I could feel my body but I couldn’t walk or see properly, leading me to start crawling towards the park.
“Everything alright, love?”
In that instant, someone picked me up. I sensed an arm around my waist and heard a man say, “You right, love?” I told this mysterious stranger that I needed to vomit. Therefore, he almost carried me over to an adjacent building and placed me into the female bathroom. He wanted to know whether I required him to stay with me but I said no.
After a short while, I felt better enough to sit on the restroom floor when from beyond the stall I heard him ask, “Are you OK, love? Do you need anything?” I could not to rise just then but I did succeed to express my gratitude and shortly thereafter regained the function of my limbs. I made my way home and spent the next few days healing from what was later diagnosed as a nasty tummy bug.
I did not see the stranger’s face – only his legs and a large steelwork tools container he had with him – but he helped me, at a moment I was at my most vulnerable.
Frequently, society can make you guarded, hostile, and combative. What he did was the kind of action that melts away that emotional callousness. He was proof that humanity’s innate tendency is to be kind, something I love in other people.
