Lucky

Written for https://fivedotoh.com/2023/09/24/fowc-with-fandango-struggle/

Sometimes life was a struggle, but there were days when it was less real. Payday often took longer to come round than she wanted it to. Although, watching her children, and whatever they had to manage, she could do anything with them there.

There were days now, where she had to use a food bank, more often than she wanted to. Yet, as she passed the homeless man, sleeping outside Asda, she counted herself lucky. She could budget, make certain food last longer than it should have been.

He had to rely on kind people, offering him snippets of their shopping. With very little money in his plastic tub, he was still grateful for the sausage roll, or hot drinks handed over to him.

She looked to her shopping bag; what could she do without this week? It wasn’t much, but when she bent down, with a packet of chocolate biscuits, she hoped it would be a treat for him.

‘Thanks love, that is really kind of you,’ he said, with a genuine smile.

They were all in this together, and the old saying her parents used to say; there for the grace of God go I. In a few days she would be paid, and there was always someone worse off.

Perhaps, when she got home, she would take her little boys to the park. While they were there, they could go to the river and feed the ducks. A good walk would do them good.