The Best Gift I Ever Gave - A Twenty Dollar Bill

SWAGG is a free mobile app (download here) that lets you shop smarter using your mobile phone. Buy, send or swap SWAGG GIFTS and organize your old school plastic gift cards.  For every download of the app between now and Dec. 31, 2010, SWAGG will donate $1 to Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) , up to $125,000.  Clever Girls Collective and SWAGG are sending a pair of movie fans to the Sundance Film Festival! Download the SWAGG app and then visit the Ultimate SWAGG Getaway Sweepstakes site to enter to win a trip for two to the Sundance Film Festival. Entry deadline is January 3, 2011, 11:59pm, PST.

Two months ago our bank account officially hit zero.  As in "if you spend any more money the bank will start coming and taking stuff from you."  We'd started the year with a hearty and well-cared for cushion of savings that quickly got eaten up by multiple medical bills, car repairs, home repairs, etc.  My husband's employer had been promising and over-due raise for months but had not delivered.  We were headed into the holiday season and weren't sure how we were going to afford fresh fruit & veggies, let alone Christmas presents. I'm not telling you this as a "boo hoo for me" kind of story - really, I'm not.  I just want to help you understand why this $20 bill meant so much to me. 

 It was early November and I was on the freeway headed to Target to return something (in hopes of keeping us out-of-the-hole until the next pay period).  It was a snowy day, my kids were playing at my dad's house and I had some seriously sad music in the CD player.  I had our last $20 for the month in my pocket and no clue how it was going to stretch us until December.  Right there in the van I had myself a little pity party, sniffles and all.Then I turned into the Target parking lot and passed a beat-up car. It was running, but parked at the back and right away I could see it was bursting at the seams with small children.  They were unbuckled and bouncing all over the car and all over eachother.  In the front, a lady was slumped over the steering wheel.  I circled a few times to make sure I had really seen what I thought I saw.  Was the person in front ill or possible dead?  Were the children in any danger?  It was so hard to tell.  So I pulled up next to them.  I got out and knocked on the driver's side window.  All the little kids in the back smiled and waved at me and started poking the woman in the front.  Slowly, she raised her head, stared at me quite bleary-eyed and rolled down her window.   I told her I was so sorry to bother her but I was worried that she might be sick and in need of some help.  She said she was just very very tired and explained that they were living at a shelter but she was so worried about her children that she never slept at night.  She was napping.Suddenly, my problems seemed so trivial.  I still had a drying tear on my cheek from my earlier "boo hoo for me" moment and I quickly wiped it away.  I asked her if I could do anything to help.  She said no, no, they were fine, she just needed a little rest. I jammed my hand in my pocket, grabbed my 20-dollar-bill and pressed it into her hand.  Said I was sorry I didn't have more to give her.  She protested, tried to hand it back, but I told her to consider it an early Christmas present, smiled and walked back to my car.  More tears.  Lots more. I'm not telling you this as a "hooray for me" kind of story either - really, I'm not.  Because what I gave that girl that day was pretty insignificant.  But what she gave me - a fresh perspective, an opportunity to serve, a kick in my pity-partying butt -  was life-altering. So why am I sharing this story with you?  Well, you probably noticed that this post was sponsored by a site called Swagg.com.  It's a free new app that manages giftcards on smartphones, which is quite handy in and of itself.  But while I was checking out their site (to see if I was interested in participating in their "Best Gift I Ever Gave" project) I learned that for every download of the app (which is free, btw) between now and Dec. 31, 2010, Swagg is going to donate $1 to Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) , up to $125,000.  Talk about a fresh perspective - if you ever find yourself a little low on gratitiude, spend an hour or so in the Pediatric Oncology department of the hospital.  You will say "good riddance" to almost any pity-party you might be throwing yourself after watching a parent hold their ill child's hand while they suffer with cancer. When I decided to write this post, I originally had planned to tell you about the year I drove an hour to get my husband a dry-erase board someone was giving away for free, because he was in his last year of a Physics degree and wanted it to work out equations on.  That was a dang good Christmas present.But the opportunity to give something to someone who needed it more than me in that Target parking lot was personally the Best Gift I Have Ever Given, or Received.  And I love that Swagg's participation in Stand Up To Cancer is giving people a chance to do something similar, just by downloading their free app.  Pretty sweet.     PS - Happy ending to the money woes I mentioned earlier: just weeks later my husband was offered a great job, closer to home and better pay, which he now loves.  Such an amazing blessing!  And we are doing just fine. Learn more about the coolest new app that revolutionizes the whole shopping, gifting, and gift card-organizing experience and Download the SWAGG app to your iPhone or Droid. I was selected for this sponsorship by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity.