Feeling So Sick I Was Unable to Walk As a Stranger Essentially Lifted Me to a Restroom.

During my my late teens, my morning travel involved an express bus. The vehicle was always crowded and would always be standing room only by the time I got on.

One particular morning, I started experiencing quite nauseous as the bus lurched around each corner. I repeatedly told myself to endure just a little longer so the bus could reached where I needed to get off, and then I could make a mad dash toward the most convenient public toilet to be sick.

As we neared the street towards the stop when it dawned on me I wasn’t going to hold on. Suddenly, it felt as if a veil came over me. My vision turned white and really quiet; as if someone muted everything. I thought, “I will lose consciousness”.

Luckily I was near the front of the bus, allowing me to take a few steps to ask the driver and requested that the driver to pull over, telling him that I was about to get ill. He opened the entrance and I stumbled out onto the sidewalk.

I was resolved to not get sick in front of six lanes of traffic, so I gathered myself and started trying to walk toward the green space opposite the street, where I thought it would allow me to find some privacy near some foliage to vomit. Yet I apparently fainted. I was aware of my physical self, yet I was unable to walk and my vision was blurry, so I began inching my way to the park.

“Are you okay, dear?”

At that moment, I got scooped up. I sensed someone holding me and heard a man say, “Everything alright, love?” I told this mysterious stranger that I needed to get to a bathroom. Therefore, he almost supported my weight into a close-by structure and put me in the ladies’ toilets. He inquired if I needed him to wait for me but I said no.

A few minutes later, I had recovered to the point of sitting on the toilet and from outside the door came his voice asking, “Do you need anything, love? Do you need anything?” I was incapable to stand up at that moment but I was able to thank him and following a brief period was able to move my legs. I got myself home and then spent the following days healing from what was later diagnosed as a horrible case of gastroenteritis.

I never saw the stranger’s face – merely his legs and a large metal toolbox he held – but he helped me, during a time when I was completely helpless.

Many times, life tends to make people guarded, hostile, and combative. His act was the type of kindness that melts away that protective shell. He served as evidence that our default setting leans toward compassion, a quality I adore about my fellow humans.