<p>What would you give someone who you never met but who did an amazing and wonderful good deed for your son? </p>
<p>Here’s the background story. My son and his friend were driving back to college yesterday after Thanksgiving, a 3-hour drive from home. After an hour on the road, they were read-ended by a car that had lost its brakes. No one was hurt, but the resulting accident involved 4 cars, at least 2 of which had to be towed including my son’s. Everything took a long time (about 2 hours) to be sorted out, but finally my son’s car was taken away. At some point my son & his friend were offered a ride the rest of the way to his college town by a woman who had stopped to make sure everyone was ok. This woman lived in a nearby town, which made her drive to my son’s college town a 4-hour roundtrip for her.</p>
<p>I asked my son to offer to pay for gas and/or dinner (it was around 7pm by the time they got back on the road) but either he didn’t offer or she didn’t accept, it’s not clear. I also asked him to get her name & address, which he did.</p>
<p>If I had her phone number I’d be calling with profuse thanks. I’d still want to follow up with a gift of appreciation.</p>
<p>Write a letter? Unsolicited gifts can be offensive to some, so I wouldn’t just send her something material, but no one is upset with getting a handwritten letter.</p>
<p>I’d most certainly write her a letter of thanks and send a gift card of some sort. I would also ask that my son handwrite a thank you card in the next few days and get it in the mail to her. This alone will probably be very meaningful as young people rarely communicate via snail-mail and it does take some effort.
What a blessing she was to make sure your son and his friend got back to school safely. That is as they say ‘priceless’.</p>
<p>Hmmm restaurants…unfortunately this is a small town. Salinas. Only 2 restaurants there are reviewed on Zagat. There seem to be many Mexican restaurants that get good reviews on Yelp. Monterey might be an option. Would an AmEx gift card for $50 offend anyone? Would $100 be over the top?</p>
<p>And yes, I’m so grateful that she was willing to drive the boys so far out of her way.</p>
<p>I was involved with a pretty significant car accident this summer–I was driving home on the highway during the rain, lost control, did a few 360s across 2 lanes of holiday weekend traffic, and hit the concrete median head on. Miraculously I walked away unscathed (a few burns from airbags on my forearms, nothing major) and no other cars or people were involved.</p>
<p>A woman stopped by my car to check to see if I was OK. Of course I was absolutely sobbing and had no idea what to do. She gave me a big hug. She carried my stuff to her car. She waved on other helpful passersby wondering if everything was OK. She let me use her phone to call my family. She stayed with me until highway patrol, ambulances, fire trucks (it was a big to-do, for sure), tow trucks, and my mom had all arrived. She was an absolute blessing, probably from God, and I am certain I owe her something major.</p>
<p>She gave me her name and phone number at some point, but with all the hustle and bustle, I unfortunately lost the paper she wrote it on. I never got the chance to thank her and I really wish I had more than just sincerely saying thank you multiple times while we were together. </p>
<p>Your son’s a lucky guy, and his Good Samaritan is clearly a wonderful person. I think a handwritten card would be perfect. Maybe some flowers too (if restaurants don’t work out)? They’re so nice this time of year, and I bet something casual like “Thanks again for brightening my day, I hope these brighten yours!” would be well received.</p>
<p>And to any of you Good Samaritans out there: everything you do is greatly appreciated!</p>
<p>It’s always heartwarming to read about those wonderful angels who commit random acts of kindness when we need it most! The other day at the stadium, a woman stopped me and handed me money that had fallen out of my pocket when I got my football ticket out of it! It was such a surprise that I could only react with heartfelt gratitude.</p>
<p>I agree that a handwritten card from both you & S would not go amiss. I think any gift card would be appreciated–Salinas also has a Macy’s, Nordstrom’s, and many others; of course Visa, AmEx, or MCard are nearly universally accepted. Flowers are always a nice gesture as well.</p>
<p>Glad everyone has handled their traffic mishaps safely!</p>
<p>My D set her wallet down on a bench at the Denver airport when she was a senior in high school, and then walked away from it. Of course it wasn’t there when we returned, and we assumed it had been stolen. Very little money in it and just her ID cards, no credit cards. </p>
<p>Within a day or two, we had a phone call from an executive asst. in another town asking us to call her and confirm that the wallet was ours and the address on the IDs was correct. Her boss had found it in the airport and took it home so his asst. could mail it to us. After I called her to confirm, she mailed it to our house with a nice note saying they hoped my D hadn’t lost too much money before he found the wallet.</p>
<p>I sent them a thank-you card and a gift box I put together with some treats from Starbuck’s and some locally made candy. I thought that would be appropriate in an office setting. Your notes of thanks will be appreciated, of course.</p>
<p>Isn’t it nice that there are good samaritans in the world? I once helped a young mother with a baby at a gas station in our downtown area. She was just frantically trying to get a portable gas can filled, while trying to deal with her baby in a stroller. I asked her if I could help her as I could see she was about to burst into tears. I drove her to her condo a few blocks away and sat with her sweet baby as she put the gas in her car. (Maybe she was late to pick up her husband? She didn’t say.) I was so glad to help her.</p>
<p>I agree with sending a nice handwritten message of thanks and a gift card. </p>
<p>We had a Good Samaritan encounter at S1’s college graduation.<br>
We got caught in very slow moving traffic on the way to the auditorium where his ceremony was to be held (big state u. / lots of cars/tough parking situation). S1 was with us so we were worried about him being late and missing something important.
We trotted through the parking lot dodging people and cars. S1 dashes off to get in line w/ classmates. </p>
<p>As DH and I were about to go in, I realize other families have tickets. I thought S1 mentioned tickets but we had none. I dialed S1 up on his cell ph. and he says “uuhhh, I left them on the dresser in my bedroom”. Too far to go back and get them…people were pouring into the auditorium. I was about to miss my firstborn’s graduation! </p>
<p>As I snapped my phone shut, a woman beside me (who must have overheard) said “How many tickets do you need? I have two extras. You’re welcome to them” and handed them to me.</p>
<p>I took them and said “thank you very much” but she was moving off into the crowd and I didn’t get a chance to say how much her kindness meant to DH (who was steaming at S1’s forgetfulness) and me. What could have been a huge disappointment turned into a great day thanks to the kindness of a stranger.</p>
<p>In addition to a handwritten thankyou, I would send this wonderful lady a very generous gift to either a fabulous restaurant or a weekend reservation at a spa. This was Thanksgiving and this dear lady spent her day with your son…a total stranger. I wish the world had more people like this. How wonderful to know your son was in good hands…priceless!</p>
<p>I do think that an AmEx or Visa gift card is wonderful too, if you cannot find a nice restaurant near her home. As far as the amount, I don’t think that $100 is out of line at all for a stranger that went of her way to do all of this.</p>
<p>Think of it this way…If your son had to stay at a hotel that night and rent a car to get back to school plus the wear and tear in terms of his time. I would go with at least a$200.00 certificate for a lady that gave up a big part of her Thanksgiving to take care of your son. Like I said before this was one of those priceless moments but it should be appreciated in a very nice way.</p>
<p>I am going to disagree on the amount of the gift card. I think if you send her an impersonal large amount of money, it is like you are paying her services. She helped because she was a nice person, probably not looking for a reward. I think a nice note and either the flowers or something that you can personalize in some way. I am probably not expressing this well and I do tend to overthink things as my husband would tell you.</p>
<p>I think that any amount of money would be nice. Flowers are nice too, but I would not send flowers to a stranger. This is a person that OP does not know. I think that a gift card is pretty universally appreciated. If she does not want to spend it on herself, she can always cross someone off that Christmas gift list, but I hope that she would spend it on herself.</p>
<p>I like the idea of a nice thank you note (which is more than sufficient, this women did not do this for the money or thank you gift) and maybe include some nice chocolates or special treats from your neck of the woods.</p>
<p>In your place I would want to send something to express my appreciation. We were on both the receiving and giving end of this kind of thing recently. In the first instance, the family sent along a gorgeous item from from the home department of a nice department store. Something like this can be ideal in that it is much more personal than a gift card, yet just as easy to exchange (which I didn’t). We did something similar for a person we know who helped one of my kids in a huge way, taking time off work and much more. I also like the idea of a gift certificate to a restaurant ,which is more of a tangible thing. I agree with the poster who said that in these circumstances a generic gift card just feels too much like paying someone for their services.</p>
<p>I like the gift card idea. She can pass it on if she doesn’t want/need it. One year when we didn’t have a lot of money and my husband’s company sent us a fancy Harry&David gift package. I would have MUCH preferred a Walmart giftcard for even HALF the cost! I don’t see how you could go wrong. That drive was a huge inconvenience and she was wonderful to do it.</p>
<p>A handwritten note, $100 gift card, and flowers would certainly not be too much for someone who spent 4 hours of their weekend to help your child out like that. IMHO, these tokens of parreciaton would not be too much.</p>
<p>This person can certainly imagine how appreciative a parent would be to a stranger who helped out their child in their hour of need.</p>