Have you ever noticed how much small children love to watch the garbage men take away the garbage? For some unexplicable reason, it’s a pastime that seems to be passed down from generation to generation.
This time around there’s Rosie Evenson, a little girl who turns 4-years-old this month and her two sisters. According to mom Angie, every week the kids “stop what they were doing and rush to the window to wave to the garbage men.”
The men– Brandon Olsen and Taylor Fritz– look forward to their weekly greeting. “The guys would always go way out of their way to wave big– you could tell they always made an intentional effort to look for the girls.”
The men grew to love the little girls so much that they personally delivered Halloween treats to the girls last year as a “thank you” for their kindness.
The girls returned the favor the next week by coloring and drawing pictures for Brandon and Taylor. Angie gave the men the drawings, along with a note… but the note came with some heartbreaking news.
Angie told Brandon and Taylor that her girls might not be at the window every Thursday now because little Rosie had been diagnosed with Stage IV kidney cancer.
“I wrote a little note saying, ‘Our little 3-year-old, Rosie, was diagnosed with cancer and has treatments on Thursdays, but keep looking for us even though sometimes we will be gone,’” said Angie. “I just wanted them to know we weren’t stopping waving at them.”
Brandon said the note broke his heart. “This family has forever changed my life — I read the note and was in near tears,” he said. “Being a father, it’s scary to think, ‘What if it were me in that situation?’”
Brandon and Taylor wanted to do something for their new friends so they approached their boss and asked if they could donate trash pickup for a full year to the family.
Their boss– the general manager of Hometown Sanitation– was touched by the offer, and he decided that the company would donate a year of garbage service to the family, free of charge.
“We realize it’s just a little bill,” he said. “But not having to worry about that one thing — we just thought that it might be helpful.”
Brandon and Taylor presented Angie with the following letter.
Little Rosie is doing well and looks for her favorite garbage men whenever she can.
“To them, they are still just their friends the garbagemen,” explained Angie. “And I love that their relationship has remained unchanged. I love the simplicity of the friendly smile and the wave — and, as a mother, I love seeing that there are still good people out there.”
