Dion’s displays strong sense of community through generosity

Pizza company gave kindly to family in state of extreme grief

In May of 2014 my husband suddenly and unexpectedly passed away. As happens when you have kind, generous family and friends, there was a food chain set up by a group of my friends to bring dinner to my house while I had so many out of town relatives here.

My children and I were still reeling from the loss and the shock and paid little attention when, with about 25 to 30 people in our home and a day before the service, my daughter called to my attention that is was 8 p.m. and the intended meal had not been delivered and we had yet to feed our guests.

There is a Dion’s Pizza not far from us. I knew they did not deliver, but assumed, if I ordered, one of my children would pick it up.

I called and explained my dilemma to this young lady who answered the phone and she immediately helped me order salads, pizzas and a couple of huge sandwich trays to feed all of these hungry people. I told her we were in a big hurry and would appreciate any help in speeding our order up!

Not one minute after I hung up the phone rang and it was she.

“Mrs. McCormick, if you will give me your address we would be happy to deliver this order. It is rather large, and it would be our pleasure to do so.”

I could not get over what a kind, generous gesture that was!

In under 30 minutes my doorbell rang and there she was, bringing in huge bowls of salads, boxes of pizzas and two huge trays of sandwiches!

I had not even bothered to ask how much it might be — it didn’t really matter, I guess. So I grabbed my credit card and handed it to her.

She quickly responded, “Oh, no, my manager (Darin Reese) said that there is no charge and that all of us are so sorry for your loss.”

I was just blown away. Yes, I have a son who has moved to New York City and is addicted to Dion’s. Yes, he has to have a “fix” upon every visit home. But these people didn’t know us.

They had no idea whether it was our first order or our one hundredth, and it didn’t matter.

That was over a year ago. The memories of that time are difficult still.

But the one thing I never want to forget, and always wanted to be able to share, is the extreme, unexpected, generous kindness of these strangers, who did a nice thing for people they didn’t even know.

I wish I had been in the state of mind to get names. But they know who they are and I just want to say thank you. Dion’s on Montgomery and Morris will always be my favorite restaurant!

PS: and yes — we gave her a big tip!