go gently into the night...

Evening at the supermarket and a young woman with a two year old girl in her arms and a four year old boy in tow entering the automatic doorway. A chubby middle aged man pushing his shopping cart out slows and then stops for the doorway to clear. The woman tries to grab a cart one handed and shifts the girl higher on her hip and pull a cart clear, but they don't cooperate, the carts are entangled and she is not able to watch the boy, get the cart and not drop the girl. I reach in and grab both carts and pull them apart and offer her a choice and as she takes one and says something I push the other into the long line of carts and smile gently at the boy, trying to make it reach my eyes and it did. Then I look at the chubby fellow waiting patiently for the world to clear his path and he nods approvingly and tenatively at me, I am above him moving into the store. Not a sound and the step on to the fourth level of defensive ethics, so seamless and in sync with the time and the deed meeting the need. Go gently...