In 1989, I unexpectedly lost my job at the Wonder Bread factory. I was a too-young single dad, and my sons were seven and eight years old. Growing boys are always hungry, but times were tough, and I didn’t know how to tell them we didn’t have enough food.
Sometimes, we would go down to this Chinese restaurant where I knew the head waitress, Lilly, and Lilly knew I wasn’t doing too well. When my sons and I would come in, she would go in the back and come out with all kinds of Chinese food. She never once asked me to pay.
In the more than 35 years since then, my sons have grown up, I’ve eaten at that restaurant hundreds of times as a paying customer, and Lilly and I became good friends.
Two summers ago, I was in the restaurant when Lilly suddenly collapsed. Paramedics tried to revive her, then rushed her away. I learned the next day that she had died. She wasn’t even 60 years old.
At the funeral, I told everyone how Lilly had helped my family and made me feel like I had dignity and respect in front of my kids, all those years ago. I told Lilly’s kids how proud she was of them and that she talked about them all the time. I told them that their mother was loved and that she touched people’s lives in ways they may have never known, in ways my own sons didn’t know.
It was hard for me to stand up there and talk. Nobody knew my story, and I stuck out as the only black man in a Chinese funeral. But I did it, because I wanted the people who loved Lilly to know the difference she’d made in the lives around her.
These days, I volunteer every Saturday at a food pantry, and for the last 10 years, I’ve worked at my local food bank, helping to provide food, dignity, and respect to people in need – the same things Lilly gave to me and my sons.
In honor of Lilly, I want to remind people to be kind to one another. You never know how far-reaching the effects will be.
With a Perspective, I’m Lloyd Jones.
Lloyd Jones is a jack-of-all-trades employee at the Marin Food Bank, making sure that food gets to the hungry.
Copyright 2017 KQED