My maiden name was not MacDonald but close, it was McLeary. When I was young, my father had a farm that had belonged to his family. The farm had two houses on it. One house had been my grandmothers and the second house was the home of the "share-cropper". The man who lived in that house was named Mr. Spratlin. Mr. Spratlin raised cotton on the farm and rented the land from my father. I think they shared the profits of the cotton. One particular weekend my older brother, my younger brother, my father and I went to visit the farm. As we approached Mr. Spratlin's house we noticed there was a new dog house nearby. As we got closer to it, my older brother looked at my father and said, "Oh no Dad!" I was unaware of the problem until my brother said, "that is solid cherry wood". Evidently there was a cherry chifforobe that had been stored in my grandmothers old house and this appeared to be what the dog house had been constructed from. As Mr. Spratlin approached he said, "I built that this week from an old piece of furniture I found in the old house. I hope that was ok." I looked at my father's face thinking he would be mad but instead he said, "well that looks like a fine dog house". On his face I saw tenderness, forgiveness and acceptance written there, not anger. I could not believe it! Why wasn't he mad? I thought, "that man is crazy!"
As we left that day I remember my father told my brothers and I that Mr. Spratlin was loosing his eyesight and he did not know he had destroyed a good piece of furniture. That was more than 50 years ago. I do not remember a lot of the conversations I had with my father during his life but I do remember that day and that message. I remember that in that moment my father saw what was truly important - another person. He did not stress over a "thing" or the loss of a tangible object. I saw true compassion for another human being. There have been times in my life when I have tried to remember that story, that day and that dog house.
That's a good story-glad you shared it.
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