Garbanzos and Other Gifts

     How my tastes have changed.
     I was a college student the first time I tried garbanzos. Yuck! A stranger named Marge, who was the age of my mother, served them on a salad to a group of us students she had invited to her home. Didn’t she realize we’d prefer pizza?
     Another person I didn’t appreciate during my college days was Olive, a woman the age of my grandmother. She lived in my home town and wrote notes to those of us studying away from home. Sweet, but I wasn’t interested in what she had to say.
     Then there was Stan, a guy I met as a college student. He was quiet, never married, worked for the same company for decades, retired, then died. But he proved to be a steadfast friend to those around him.
     Over the decades my appreciation of the ways of Marge, Olive, and Stan has grown. Their soft footprints across life’s stage went mostly unnoticed, yet they left behind gifts - hospitality, encouragement, and friendship. These days I want to follow in their steps and leave simple gifts behind, too.
     And sometimes I serve garbanzos on salads.