Paying it forward.

Last December, stepping off a curb on a dark, rainy night, I broke my ankle. It was a bad break and I went straight to the emergency room and had surgery the next morning. I had told my dog I'd be back in a couple of hours and came home three days later. Once home, I couldn't leave my third floor apartment for six weeks. I was not allowed to put any weight on the broken ankle, so I had to have a walker. Yes, don't laugh, a walker. My friend Joni 'pimped my walker' with a bike basket with cherries along the edge and I hopped around for the next month or so, carrying my belongings, room to room, in my basket. When it came time to part with my trusty walker, I posted it on craigslist. I heard from a woman who's elderly father was coming to visit and she was in need of walker to help him get around her home. She offered to pay me for the walker, but it didn't feel right taking money for it. She asked me what she could do for me, what my hobbies were. I told her reading and photography. In one of the more sublime moments in my life, Frish Brandt, the Director of the esteemed Fraenkel Gallery, walked into my office to retrieve the walker and offered me a beautifully bound book in exchange. I looked down at the cover and was completely caught off guard. Because there in my hands was a documentary account of the amazing Diane Arbus exhibit which I had just seen at SFMOMA. Diane Arbus is my all time favorite photographer, so to have this absolute stranger walk in to my life to retrieve something from me that was a painful memory and replace it with the art that I love seemed like karma. And the very best kind. Just a story to remind us of life's surprises, good karma, and paying it forward.