Unintentional Donations

So funny that my last posting was about some items being unintentionally donated.

I received an email from a gal at the school office Tuesday afternoon.

“Mary, I think there might be two or three vacuum attachments in one of the bags I left for you today. I just sold the vacuum. Could you please check?”

Sure enough, there they were. Got them back to her the next morning so the attachments and vacuum could be reunited.

Made me remember another vacuum story.

Last year, on a Friday evening, I was having a glass of wine at my neighbor’s house on her front patio.

Along comes another neighbor to visit. Probably had a glass or two of something before he arrived but certainly did not seem impaired in any way.

His wife had already left the  country with their children. He was staying in the nearly empty house while finishing up his last days of work in Malaysia.

We chatted about this and that. What we would be doing on the weekend. I mentioned that we were having a huge garage sale with the proceeds benefitting the refugee center.

He asked if I’d like a vacuum cleaner. Said it was a good one and he’d like to donate it. I told him that would be fabulous and he was welcome to leave it on my patio before 6:30am the next day.

I bid them both a good night and went home to get a decent sleep.

When I woke up the next morning the vacuum was by the front door. So very nice and generous of him.

It was one of the first things to sell that day. Yay!

Couple of days later this guy sends out a message to a group of neighbors. Something like, “This might sound like a weird question. But does anyone know where my vacuum is?”

LOL.

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Reminiscing #2

In my last posting I stated that we were waiting for an email reply from our friend and neighbor in California.

My husband had sent an email to him Sunday morning. Saying that we were reminiscing about the good old days. When Jim tried to make a golfer out of my husband! And how we had the best neighbor.

That evening we still hadn’t heard anything back.

I figured he was away. We can’t expect everyone, a world away, to respond immediately. No matter how prompt we consider them. Can we?

But I had a weird feeling. A sinking feeling.

And I googled our friend’s name.

His smiling face popped up immediately.

In his obituary.

I just said, “Oh, God!”

Jim passed away at the end of June. I had no idea.

I had emailed him in April about my father’s passing. He replied how sorry he was for our loss. Said my father was a great guy. He had met my Dad on two different occasions and they enjoyed chatting about golf and other things.

He also said he was sorry for the delay in responding since he had been in the hospital for a week.

He wrote, “But I am okay now.”

I responded with an email including a “Hope it was nothing serious.”

That last time was the end of May and the next month he was gone.

My eyes kept tearing up all evening. It was the shock of it. And the loss of a truly wonderful person.

It’s telling that I had at least four postings about him in the past. Which I will soon share.

He was brilliant and an inventor. We wouldn’t be sitting here on our computers now if it wasn’t for the likes of him. A pioneer in Silicon Valley. And yet he was one of the most down to earth fellows you would ever want to meet. He was kind, generous and humorous.

He set the stage and paved the way for all of the Scottish folks I would meet in my travels. I would have to immediately like them if they were like Jim, right?

But he raised the bar for them. And for everyone else.

Rest in peace, my friend. We will miss you.

Jim McDiarmid

1940-2015

 

 

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