Dear editor,
I have to give a huge (!!!) shout-out to the staff of the White Spot restaurant in Courtenay.
My dad has gone there almost every day for the past five years to enjoy his lunch. The staff all know him by name. They say hi. They know his lunch order.
They stop and chat briefly amidst the craziness that is a restaurant lunch hour. They connect with him. And they cheerfully wish him a good day when he leaves.
Whenever I accompany my father there, it warms my heart to see the way they treat him. It means so much to know they take a small bit of time to connect like that.
But what has really touched me is the greeting the White Spot crew gave my dad this past weekend.
My father moved recently and hadn't been to the White Spot in four weeks. Staff member after staff member came by our table to say hi, to ask if my dad had been away, to ask if he was all right.
To a person, they said they had wondered where my dad had been and were glad to see him.
On learning that my dad had moved, one of the staff, Jason Fowler, asked him if he would like to be picked up at his new home and be brought to the restaurant.
Jason offered to do this on his day off, no less! He said he knew my dad really liked the White Spot and that all of the staff would want to make sure he could get down to the restaurant if he wanted to.
The manager, Julie, came by a moment later. She offered to do the same thing!
To say I was touched really is to make the understatement of the year. For whatever else there is in the world and our sometimes-silly lives, there is also love.
I'm thankful for this example, and I think others should be heartened by it, too.
Paul Lidgate,
Victoria