Stranger's Random Act Of Kindness Hits Home For Hillsborough Mom

HILLSBOROUGH, NJ — Mary Reid-Schweiger is the first to admit that when she walked into a Hillsborough ShopRite store for what she expected was just a few items for a Fourth of July party, her demeanor wasn't exactly festive.

As is often the case with shoppers, Reid-Schweiger found herself more items than what she expected. The added items, she knew, would hike up the amount of her final bill, which continued to keep her mood on edge. But in an unexpected turn of events, the random kindness of a stranger not only flipped Reid-Schweiger’s mood but impacted the mother of four in a way she may have not expected.

In an email to Patch, Reid-Schweiger wrote that a man who first smiled at her and then asked how she was doing, ended up paying for her entire order. When she asked why he made the gesture, the man who she admits she didn’t want to tell she was feeling “grumpy” said he was simply living out what his mother taught him as a child.

Making someone else's day by striving to do good deeds as his mother instructed, he said, was his way of honoring her. Reid-Schweiger was rendered speechless, which she wrote to Patch, doesn't happen very often.

“This was expensive — this was a lot of money in my cart,” she told Patch in a telephone interview Wednesday, four days after the fact. “It was weird. I was just floored. ….I was in shock. I didn’t know what to say.”

Before being able to utter any sort of response to the stranger’s kindness, Reid-Schweiger said she could feel the tears welling up. She tried to tell the man that she had items that would add up to a large bill. The man, in turn, told the cashier to add Reid-Schweiger’s tally to his.

Reid-Schweiger felt as if she should do something but continued to struggle with words to express her gratitude. She finally managed to offer a simple “thank-you”, which the stranger ensured her was more than enough.

The two carried on a short conversation after the fact as he bagged Reid-Schweiger’s groceries. Reid-Schweiger said that in the past, her husband has purchased a stranger’s coffee at a local Dunkin’ Doughnuts and that her mother has had a stranger pay for her lunch at Wendy’s. But as the first-time recipient of this kind of random kindness, Reid-Schweiger said the man’s generosity still hasn’t completely sunk in.

The experience caused her to leave the local ShopRite, feeling "wholeheartedly humble," Reid-Schweiger wrote in her email to Patch.

After returning home, Reid-Schweiger told her family what had happened because she wanted her children to know that people who want to do good in the world exist. She said Wednesday that such kindness is not often put on display, but that it has inspired her to find ways to pay the kindness back where she can.

After learning that the stranger's kindness was a result of a childhood lesson, she hopes her four children will want to follow through with the lessons Reid-Schweiger and her husband are teaching. But, she said, it goes beyond her kids.

“This really left a huge impact on me,” she said. “…This just really changes your perspective and (impacts) how I see things going forward even if it’s a few small smiles or thank-you’s along the way.”

She added: “There are just people out there that are just super kind. I just think of Hillsborough and it’s a great place to live and not only is it a great place to live, but wow. Look at the people who live here. Look at what this guy did. It’s more than what you read in a magazine (about great places in New Jersey to live). Now, I have proof that it’s about the community and the people who make it up that make the town what it is.”