I pushed my shopping cart into the checkout lane at the market. In front of me was a young lady, about 5'2" blonde hair looking a little raggedy, already checking out. As the cashier told her what her bill was, she burst into to tears. Through the tears she cried "I don't have that much, I don't have enough for half of this."
The cashier spoke up, "Pick out what you do want and hurry up, people are waiting." She began to move the items into different piles as she cried, "I don't know which ones I want, I'm so upset!"
The cashier looked at me and said, "Number 6 is open Sir, this is going to take a while."
The lady looked back at me, with tear stained eyes and said, "I'm sorry, everything is just a mess."
As I looked at the lady I couldn't believe my eyes and exclaimed, "Donna, is that you?"
She looked at me and eyed me up and down and cried, "Chuck? My God, I haven't seen you in ten or is it twelve years?"
The lady then gave me a big smile as I said to the cashier, "Don't separate those things, just add them to my bill." Donna looked back at me and said, "You don't have to do this, I'll just pay for half."
"Nonsense," I said, "Don't worry about it we'll figure it all out."
I paid for the groceries and we went outside where I loaded her groceries into her car and ask her, "I'm so glad to see you, how have you been?"
She didn't answer immediately but I then noticed her clothes were dirty and her car looked bad and it looked like she was living out of it. Donna began to cry and answered, "Things haven't been too good lately, Chuck - in fact they have been pretty bad." She continued, "After you and joined the service I let myself go and got into drugs and alcohol and then trouble." As I looked at her and she was about 15 pounds lighter than she was in 1972 but she still had that pixie little girl look.
I then said, "You quit writing and when I tried to find you, you had disappeared and I had no idea where you went. What happened, where did you go, what do you do for a living?"
She hung her head and softly replied, "I'm on welfare and I can't seem to hold a job and I just got kicked out of my apartment yesterday."
I listened as she told me about getting into the wrong crowds and going downhill fast. I took her hand and walked her over to a Denny's, in the same parking lot, and when we were seated I asked, "Why did you quit writing and why did you let yourself go?"