Another gentleman surfaces

"Let me hold onto your cart while you unload," said the charming middle-aged gentleman as he approached in the grocery store parking lot a few minutes ago.  The lot is on a bit of a slant and my cart kept drifting away.  "Thank you very much," I replied in surprise.  "Your mother certainly brought you up well," I added, as I usually do when a man holds a door or performs some other act of politesse. 

"Actually, it was my father.  I was raised by my father, the finest gentleman who ever lived, in my opinion."  "Well, that's obvious," I agreed.  With that he helped unload my parcels and departed saying, "Here, let me take that cart back for you girl." 

Will wonders never cease.  Calgary is often a town of old-world manners, where men are men and women are to be tended to.  I love it because it's so comfortable and predictable for someone raised as I was by a father and uncles who were unfailingly considerate and kind.  My mother and aunts were treated like gold.  Mutual respect between man and wife was the watchword.  I took it for granted, but have since learned that many households were not as genteel as mine. 

Speaking of gentlemen, I met another last Friday.  He owns the roofing company that is currently replacing all the roofs on the townhouses in our neighbourhood.  Concerned I would not be able to put my flowers in until they finish, I stopped to ask the young man when they would complete the job?  "I want to put my flowers in, but am worried they will be ruined with the tiles falling on them," I said.  With a distinct French accent, he replied, "Don't worry about a thing.  Let me look at your backyard and see what we can do." 

He accompanied me to our unit and assured me they would move all the pots and chairs and that no harm would come to my flowers.  "That's what sets us apart from other roofers, we don't damage anything," he said in French, which we were now speaking.  The name of his company is 'The God Roofing Company'.  Curious about the name, I asked how he chose it.

"A few years ago I fell off a roof and should have either died or been paralyzed," he explained.  "The doctor told me to get on my knees because he had no idea why I had survived intact with just two broken ankles," he explained, tapping the steel plates in his legs.  It is in gratitude for his life that he named his company after God. 

He was a very cool cat.