How a truck driver turned a stressful traffic bind into a 'heartwarming' one
A Halifax woman's belief in Good Samaritans was reinforced Friday when a delivery truck driver escorted her visually impaired daughter through tall snowbanks and busy traffic on a crowded downtown street.
Carole Buchanan was driving her 41-year-old daughter Jenny Morash to an afternoon hair appointment on Argyle Street when a Sysco delivery truck ahead of her stopped in front of Neptune Theatre. Buchanan was boxed in on the one-way street with a delivery van to her right, snowbanks a few metres high to her left, and busy Sackville Street to her back.
"I was feeling quite stressed, actually," she said. "Next thing I know, as I'm backing up to see if I could get through it, this gentleman comes around the front of [my vehicle] with a safety vest on."
Driver could have just 'walked away'
The driver helped them get to a spot where it was safe for Morash to exit the vehicle. But because of the snow, Buchanan still couldn't get out.
The driver, having learned Morash is blind, asked if he could escort her to the sidewalk. Snow was piled high on the street and curbside after two powerful winter storms hit Atlantic Canada within the last week.
"He could have just helped us get out of the whole boxed-in situation and walked away and called it a day," said Morash, who called the driver's offer "heartwarming."
"He didn't grab my arm and try to tug me like Theodore Tugboat or anything. He offered me his arm and didn't move so slowly that he made me feel like an invalid, but didn't try to rush me through the snow."
No response from company
While waiting for her daughter's hair appointment to finish, Buchanan snapped pictures of the truck and posted them on Sysco's Facebook page. It may not have been a life-or-death situation, but she nonetheless wants to sing the driver's praises to the company.
Buchanan said she hasn't heard from the company, which markets and delivers food to restaurants, hospitals and other facilities.
"[I want] to try to thank him properly because I really I know so many people who do so many kind things for so many people, very rarely do you get the chance to really feel that someone has gone over and above a kind act," she said.
"I just wanted his company to know that they had such a good employee, driving those huge trucks in narrow streets packed with snow and being kind on top of it."
