Pizza man drives 7 hours for special delivery to terminally ill patient

[left-of-center2012]

Julie and Rich Morgan spent just two years living in Battle Creek, but Steve’s Pizza left a lasting impression on them. “It’s just the best pizza, and we’ve never had anything as good,” Julie Morgan said. Now, more than two decades after they left the city, Steve’s Pizza has made another impression, this time because of an extraordinary act of kindness by one of its employees.

For Julie Morgan's 56th birthday in September, the couple was planning to return to Michigan to revisit Steve’s Pizza. Instead, Rich Morgan, who has a form of salivary gland cancer, went to the hospital, where he ended up in the intensive care unit. He was told he had days, maybe weeks, left to live.

And so, this past Saturday evening, David Dalke, Julie Morgan’s father, decided to give Steve’s Pizza a call. “I thought maybe just some contact from Steve’s Pizza, maybe a note, I thought I might be asking too much, but I contacted them,” Dalke said.

Dalke spoke to Dalton Shaffer, one of the managers. He didn’t get a note. He got a question about what kind of pizza Julie and Rich Morgan liked. Steve's doesn't deliver, but Shaffer was about to make an exception. “I reiterated to him, ‘Dalton, we are in Indianapolis, and that’s a 3½-hour drive one way.’ and he said ‘That’s fine,’” Dalke said.

Full story at:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/10/19/pizza-delivery-teen-drives-7-hours-cancer-patient/1701759002/

[tblue37]

1. He worked a full sift, then after closing up the shop late at night, he

drove all that way and back, knowing he had to work a full shift the next day!

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So after closing the store at 10:15 p.m. that night, Shaffer hopped in his car with a pepperoni and a pepperoni and mushroom pizza and drove to Indianapolis.

At about 2:30 a.m., Dalke and the Morgans’ children greeted Shaffer.

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“I took a couple 5-hour Energys,” Shaffer said. “I had to, I was super tired, but I made it and that’s what counts. It was worth it. I’m glad I did that.” He said he thought it would be "a kept quiet kind of thing.

“I wasn’t going to tell anyone about it," Shaffer said. "I didn’t even tell my uncle or anything when I left for Indiana

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[Botany]

2. Something is in my eye.

Shaffer, 18, is the nephew of Jeremy Shaffer, the owner of Steve’s Pizza. He’s been working there for about two years.


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“I just wanted to do that for them,” he said. “I just wanted to make them happy.”

So after closing the store at 10:15 p.m. that night, Shaffer hopped in his car with a pepperoni and a pepperoni and mushroom pizza and drove to Indianapolis.

At about 2:30 a.m., Dalke and the Morgans’ children greeted Shaffer.

snip

Dalke offered to put Shaffer up for the night, but Shaffer turned him down, saying he had to drive back because he worked later that day. Dalke offered to pay for the pizza and for gas, but Shaffer turned him down on that as well, eventually only “reluctantly” accepting some money that Dalke pushed into his hand before he left, Dalke said.

[tblue37]

3. Here is the young man:

[Freedomofspeech]

4. What a great story...

What a kind young man.