Angel of Black Friday

This year I ventured into the world of Black Friday shopping, Canadian style.  There were no stampedes or people getting trampled but there were some pretty good deals.  I spent a good hour in line in Aeropostale, which is mortifying to admit out loud let alone type in my blog.  While I tried to be patient in waiting in the bedazzled hoodie-lined aisles, I felt fortunate to be there on my own.  The woman behind me had a double stroller occupied by a 6 month old boy and a 15 month old girl.  And she was smiling.  Truly unbelievable.  I was so taken aback by her calm demeanor (which i couldn't pull off and i was there by myself) that I complimented her on how well she was doing.  She proceeded to tell me that she'd left three kids (all under 5) at home!  While my inside-my-head voice said, "yikes!", the polite side of me asked her about her kids.  The more I learned, the more I realized that I was standing in front of a modern day angel.  Of her five kids under five years of age, 3 were foster kids and two had been adopted after she had fostered them.  The kids that were with her were happy, she was happy and honestly, it was pretty inspiring.   Certainly not inspiring enough to have more kids or wait obscene amounts of time in a teen clothing store, but inspiring in a "there are still really good people in the world" sort of way.  I'll take it.