Posted on 01/06/2014 4:28:56 PM PST by Rebelbase
The Cracker Barrel customer had a checkbook, and what he wrote in it after lunch Thursday would make his happy server even happier, but first he and his friend had a few questions.
They asked the hostess: Can you give us your grumpiest server? We want to make them laugh.
Sorry, the hostess said. Nobody grumpy here. I’ll seat you with our happiest.
At Table 222, they asked Abigail Sailors for the special — turkey and dressing — and for eggs and sausage.
Then they asked the 18-year-old why she was so happy.
And over the course of their meals, she told them.
About her childhood. The youngest of five from Falls City was just 7 months old when her parents crashed their car on the back roads to St. Joseph, Mo. Her mother never fully recovered from her brain injury, and her father wasn’t fit to be a father.
They were scattered to three foster homes, then reunited under the same roof. They endured abuse there for years, said Abigail’s older sister, Sydnie Murphy. That foster father is still in prison.
“All the horror stories you hear about foster care,” Sydnie said, “we lived through it.”
The state split them again — some to other homes, Abigail and Sydnie and a brother eventually to their father’s house. But then he was arrested for abuse, too.
They didn’t find real stability until about nine years ago, when John and Susi Sailors took them in. And kept them. And raised them. And loved them like they love their own five children.
“It’s a great home, great people, amazing,” said Abigail, who took their last name. “I don’t know how I would have turned out if I didn’t have them. They shaped the person I am today.”
Abigail still sees her birth mom. In fact, she and Sydnie were picking her up at her rehabilitation home in Omaha and taking her out for pizza Thursday night.
After she talked about her past, Abigail told her customers about her future. Which was on hold. She had just finished her first semester at Trinity Bible College in North Dakota, where she’s studying youth ministry and psychology.
But she’s paying her own way, and didn’t have enough money for the spring semester. So she was saving her wages and tips to add to her financial aid, and planned to return next fall. She was thinking about taking online courses until then.
“She’s always been a good worker and paid her own bills and saved her money,” her foster father said. “She’s a great girl. It’s amazing where she is from, what she’s been through.”
And that — all of that — was why she was so happy, the server told her customers.
Her life could be worse. But it isn’t.
“I’m just thankful. Everything we went through, my attitude is: God blessed me with a lot of things. I’m doing good. That’s all that matters to me.”
The customers — one older, one middle-aged — kept asking questions. Abigail kept answering. She didn’t know them. They weren’t regulars at the north Lincoln restaurant. She did learn they were from Nebraska, and she learned their names, but didn’t feel right sharing them.
When the men were finished eating, one told her he had graduated from Trinity.
He opened his checkbook.
He wrote one check to the college for $5,000, for her tuition.
He wrote one check to her for $1,000, for whatever she needed.
He left a $100 tip she split with another server.
And Abigail, who’d felt like she already had so much, now had even more.
“I couldn’t believe it. I tried to thank them, and they said, ‘thank God.’”
What goes around, comes around
A few years ago, a friend and I got together for lunch a week or so before Christmas. In the same restaurant were two army listed men in camo fatigues. I asked the waitress to bring me their bill, $29.63 with tip, and I paid it for them. I feel I still owe them much more.
Later that day, on my way home from work, I stopped at a department store to finish my Christmas shopping. It was hectic and as I waited my turn at the jewelry counter, customer after customer snapped at the lone clerk working. When it was finally my turn, I smiled at her and asked her to help me pick out some earrings for my three daughters. I had a few other things from other sections of the store to pay for and, eyeing the long check out line, the clerk offered to check out my things at her counter. One of the items came up with the wrong price. I pointed that out gently and she looked it up manually and saw that I was correct. She started to apologize and I laughed about it, telling her it was no big deal. I asked her how she stayed sane in this mad house of Christmas shopping. She smiled and told me people had been practically screaming at her all day and I was the first person to treat her civilly. She was so grateful, she told me I was getting the “family and friends” discount. I thanked her, wished her a Merry Christmas and went home.
At home I looked at the receipt. My discount came to exactly $29.63.
Gifts under $13,000 are tax-free; also if the check was made out to the school instead of her it has no tax implication at all.
“Facebook is no place for Christian girls!”
What???
That’s as silly as saying Free Republic is full of racists. Just because a few nut case posters make racially stupid comments doesn’t make the site racist. Just because some girls make idiots of themselves on FB doesn’t make the site stupid.
Or does the phrase ‘guns don’t kill people, people kill people’ get lost on you?
“She received two payments
A taxable tip and a non taxable scholar ship.
“
It is amazing how invasive and corrupting our tax code is.
I think she actually got a possible tax deductible (to the donor) scholarship, a non tax deductible gift, and a taxable tip.
Awesome story!
thanks RB
nice story
the good guys are still out there wearing the white hats.
Not a coincidence. You've been spoken to by God.
That’s a great story, thanks for posting it. Every once in a while it’s good to remember how God cares for us. Nothing could be clearer than God’s love (and genuine hope) spread through an anonymous couple as this article has demonstrated.
I'm neither a CPA or a tax lawyer, but I think gifts are non-taxable.
BTTT
bkmk
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