This Woman Helping A Blind Man Hail A Cab Is The Kindness We Need Right Now
We could all use a little help every once in awhile
Everyone needs the kindness of strangers once in a while and when the gesture is noticed and can be shared, even better. Baseball fan Ryan Hamilton was sitting out at a rooftop restaurant after a Cubs game on Saturday when he saw a man who was visually impaired struggling to hail a cab. That’s when a young girl stepped in to help, and the rest is history.
Yusef Dale walked out of Wrigley Field, where the Cubs were playing the Cardinals, and into the street, where the loud chaos of traffic and fans made hailing a cab difficult. Lucky for Dale, there was a Good Samaritan standing nearby ready to offer help.
Casey Spellman, who was visiting Chicago from Indianapolis, approached Dale and offer to help flag down a taxi and wait with him until one arrived.
Unknown to Dale and Spellman, Hamilton was watching from above and snapped a few pictures of the exchange, posting them on his Facebook page. “There was a blind Cubs fan trying to hail a cab for several minutes until the lady came up and asked him if he needed help hailing a cab. Awesome to see such kindness in a world that the media portrays so much hate in,” Hamilton wrote.
His post has since gone viral with people sharing and commenting about how nice it is to see something we can all smile about. We’d like to think Spellman’s gesture would be something anyone would do to help another human being out, but so many of us are heads down in our phones or in the rush of our own lives, it seems her kindness is the exception rather than the norm these days.
Dale, an assistant U.S. attorney, tells Chicago’s WGN9 News that his friend called to tell him his story was on the news. He said his friend was like, “You never accept help. How did it come to be that that day you accepted the help?”
Dale explained to WGN that he doesn’t usually accept assistance but, “It was generally a chaotic scene,” and he was appreciative of Spellman’s help. “She did not presume that I was incompetent or unable. She didn’t get into my personal space. Most important, she didn’t grab me or touch me without me even knowing who she was, which is a common refrain you hear from people with disabilities,” he explained.
Spellman just happened to be there when Dale needed it and is happy she is getting the attention she deserves. “The power of social media is amazing,” he said, “You fully appreciate it when you are directly impacted by it.”
There is still so much good in the world, we just need to look up and see it.
