When It’s Terrific Tuesday Every Day

Our store is across the street from a nursing home. Almost every day, we see an older couple come into the store to just look around. They go through the same routine every day, and they don’t really buy anything, but we don’t mind. 

The husband comes over to me one day after we make eye contact and I smile at him a little.

Husband: “I wanted to say thanks for letting us come in every day. It really means the world to us.”

Me: “Oh, it’s no bother at all. I’m sure there are nicer places to visit than this little old store, though!” 

Husband: “Well, it’s for my wife. She has trouble remembering these days, but we always used to come to this store together every Tuesday, and she’d work through her list, thinking up all the dinners she’d feed us all week until the next Tuesday. She doesn’t remember who I am most days, but every time we come in here, it’s suddenly Tuesday, and she gets all excited about the dinners she wants to make.”

Me: “Oh… I… I don’t know what to say.” 

Husband: “Nothing to say. I just wanted to say thank you.”

His wife walked past with a list in her hand, smiling and calling her husband over to help her choose a cereal.

Every day for the next year, we’d see them reliving her Tuesdays, happy with her list, until one day we didn’t see them for a while. He came back a few weeks later to tell us that his wife was grocery shopping in Heaven now, and he couldn’t wait to try some of the meals she was cooking up for him one day.

We all loved him for how much he loved her.