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A Smile of Gratitude

A Story From An IHN Temporary Neighbor

Saturday evening at the IHN hosting, being such a beautiful summer evening, most of the children wanted to play outside. And, they did, watched over by their mothers and the group of volunteer hosts.

This bevy of small children running around, blowing bubbles and playing all sorts of outside games, caught the eyes of the occupants of the infrequent cars that passed and also those of a small young mixed breed dog across the street. The little dog could no longer resist the temptation to join the party and, grabbing his favorite toy bone, came bouncing across the street, followed in short order by the home owner holding her young son. She came to retrieve the dog and apologize for his intrusion.

I quickly attempted to block the dog from any contact with our guest children. But the constantly wiggling pup, wagging tail and teeth already embedded into a rawhide bone, let me know there was not too much danger lurking in this situation. Plus, it was too late to establish any separations - the dog and the children immediately became one big frolicking party.

As the dog's owner and I were introducing ourselves, one of the children's mothers joined us wanting to know all about the dog and saying how much she enjoyed animals. I made sure they were introduced and as our three way conversation went on it evolved into two young women and mothers in a sharing conversation. I became less of a participant and more of an observer. Their discussion, originally centered around this dog, then pets in their past, then phased into general life issues and some past and current joys and concerns. One shared a quite heart rending, fairly recent life-changing moment in her and her family's life.

Her conversation partner responded with such loving comments. No professional counselor could have done more to instill such a level of peace and comfort to the concerned mother.

Just then, the call went out that it was time for the guests to wind down the party and get ready to go in and prepare for bedtime. I watched as the one mother picked up her son and, with the still bouncing dog, walked back across the street to her beautiful Glendale home and the other young woman to her refuge in a church basement. But, as the neighbor got to her sidewalk, she paused, turned around and smiled. It was a smile of gratitude for the so very kind words of understanding, support and encouragement that she had just received from our IHN guest - her temporary neighbor.