A Red Deer couple’s act of kindness overwhelmed not just the recipient who is struggling and working two jobs, but an entire auto shop staff who were also all brought to tears.
Myrna Supnad, 37, came to Canada from the Philippines four years ago with the dream of a brighter future. To make ends meet, she works as a nanny and an aide and sends what spare cash she does have back home to her parents.
It made the idea of trying to come up with $1,800 to pay for an assortment of engine repairs to her 10-year-old vehicle overwhelming.
While she was receiving the bad news over the phone from auto service advisor Lureen Davidson at the Red Deer North Canadian Tire last Thursday, a woman waiting her turn in line overheard the conversation and offered to put $200 towards the bill.
And she wasn’t done. She went home and told her husband the situation, and he wanted to do more.
The couple, who want to remain anonymous, returned on Friday and paid another $1,000 of the tab.
For Supnad, the generosity gave her a completely different overwhelming feeling.
“I was so very happy,” she said, whose husband is a mechanic in Saudi Arabia who is trying to immigrate to Canada.
The couple who paid her auto repair bill did not do it for any recognition; they did it because they could and they saw someone who was in need, quoting scripture: “But when you give to someone in need, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing (Matthew 6:3).”
“I just feel it’s important to — what I call it — pass it over the fence,” said the husband. “When I’m gone, it’s what you do in life, while you can, to make things better for people. Who’s going to care how big my bank account is?”
Davidson, 50, has worked with Canadian Tire for 10 years and though she often sees people help out with a few dollars here and there, an anonymous random act of kindness on this scale is not something she has seen before.
But she says the story has inspired many others to pay it forward.
“It’s not about the money, it’s about the generosity of what it was, we were all crying,” said Davidson, adding she couldn’t help but run around the counter and give the Good Samaritan a hug when he came in on Friday. “Every time I tell someone that story ... people are saying they are going to do something nice for someone else. It’s been crazy.”
The Good Samaritan says it is heartwarming to hear others are picking up on their one act.
He and his wife have already had more than they ever could expect from it.
“I got so many hugs, and I feel that was unmerited,” he said with a chuckle.
jaldrich@www.reddeeradvocate.com