We’ve all had days like this. Too many customers all at once, too many distractions, too many orders to fill. People waiting impatiently for their flu shots, having to interview a job candidate in the midst of it all. On this day she was in charge of the busy pharmacy inside our favorite supermarket.

We had spent a stressful five hours at an eye care hospital, about 10 miles away, as my bride underwent a surgical procedure on her eye.  No food since midnight, she came through fine, and I listened carefully to the surgeon’s post-op instructions as he handed me prescriptions for three separate eye drops. One each in her left eye, five minutes apart, every two hours through the evening and again the next morning.

Heading homeward, we planned to stop at our favorite pharmacy, the one in that supermarket near our home, to get those prescriptions filled, but we were halted by a road-paving project that paralyzed traffic for several minutes.

Finally we made it to the store, only to be told  the bad news. The pharmacy could fill two of the three prescribed eye drops but not the third. Then the kind woman stepped in. She interrupted what she was doing and phoned every other pharmacy in the area she could think of. None had the eye drops we needed. She took down our phone number and hours later, called to tell us that the eye drops should arrive at the store about 1 p.m. the next day. Again she apologized that she couldn’t fill that prescription for us when we first requested it.

We will stop by the store at 1, hoping. We are so grateful for the kindness of someone who was much too busy to deal with us and too stressed, but she saw someone in need and stepped in to do all she could to help.

Today’s word: pronunciation of Hallowe’en. Historically, the holiday is commemorated on the night before All Saints Day, a religious event also known as All Hallows Day. It is a solemn occasion honoring those who have died. Hallowe’en, the night before, is all Hallow’s Eve, a time for merriment, but many mispronounce it as if the occasion were hollow. It isn’t. Far from it. Make the hallow rhyme with shallow, not hollow.