When I was a little boy growing up my Mom, Dad, two brothers and I all lived with my Nana in her drafty, 75 year old house. It was heated by a single coal stove in the living room. And it was also only 10 yards away from the railroad tracks. I remember that the house would shake when the long coal trains would pass. I always worried that one of the coal cars would tip over and destroy our home. Well one day one of those coal cars did tip over but thankfully it was several hundred yards up the track. Some of the coal had fallen into the river nearby but most was over the side of the hill and mixed with dirt. Even back then coal was expensive and we really needed the coal that had fallen from the car but there was no way to get to it.

Several weeks later, though, I saw something I had never seen before. It was a tiny coal car less than half the size of a regular one. And it was coming down the tracks to our house. It had picked up what coal that could be recovered from the spill. The men stopped the coal car by our house and after talking with my Dad dumped the coal in our yard. We still had to carry it into our coal shed but there was more than enough coal there to keep us warm through the coming Winter. That January as we huddled around the coal stove for warmth I remembered the kindness of the railroad men. They didn’t have to give us the coal. They could have dumped it anywhere, but they saw our need and through their kindness warmed our home and our hearts.

These days I have electric heat and don’t miss shoveling and carrying coal one bit. But I still remember the kindness of those men that day so long ago. They reminded me again of why we are here. We are here to love each other. We are here to help each other. We are here to be kind to each other. God put us here to make this world better with our lives and to warm the hearts of others with our love. May we always do so!