- Courtney Crawford Dreaded First Mother’s Day Since Her Mom’s Death
- But a kind gesture from a customer means they can finally afford an urn.
A struggling Starbucks worker has made a heartbreaking appeal to find the customer whose small kindness has helped transform the Mother’s Day she dreaded.
Courtney Crawford starts work at 4 a.m. at the Little Rock, Arkansas branch, which was mom Tammy’s favorite place before she tragically died of cancer in June of last year.
A grumpy early-morning customer handed management a note saying Courtney had “made a difference” in his day and enclosing $200 for the barista to “treat himself.”
Courtney ended her shift by recording a TikTok saying that the money would finally allow her to buy an urn to bring her mother’s remains home in time for Sunday.
“Thank you for the impact you had on my life, and I hope you see this and know that you did something I will never forget,” she said through tears.
More than 3.8 million people have viewed the TikTok Courtney Crawford recorded immediately after her life change at Starbuck in Little Rock.
Courtney said her mother Tammy (left) was her best friend and works at the same Little Rock branch her mother would visit before her death last year.
Courtney said she was “dreading” the first Mother’s Day since her mother’s death from cancer.
The 32-year-old woman works three jobs to cover the bills, but that doesn’t stop her from being “very happy.”
“This morning I was loud and proud and full of life and a woman came in and I could tell she was struggling and I was like a little extra pep in our step, today we gotta make her smile,” she posted.
‘So we did and a couple of minutes later she came in and gave my manager a note and asked him to give it to me.
‘It says: ‘I travel a lot for work, which usually requires me to stay late at night and very early in the morning.’
‘I’ve been here for two days and so far, you’ve been the only person I’ve met who has been genuinely kind. You were the first face I saw this morning and you really made my day.
‘I’m sure you’re exhausted because, life, right? That’s all of us. But you deserve to know that you made a difference in someone’s day today simply by being kind.’
The woman who signed “Groggy at 5am” suggested to Courtney to “treat yourself to something nice, I can tell you deserve it, maybe not just coffee, ha ha.”
“Do good in this world and it will always come back to you,” he added.
Courtney says she is an “upbeat” person and decided to use her skills to cheer up the “groggy” customer when he arrived at 5 a.m.
Courtney was the oldest of Tammy’s six children.
“And I’d be lying to you if I told you I don’t dread Mother’s Day,” she told TikTok.
“I have the job at Starbucks on top of my full-time job because I have a lot of bills to pay and a lot of debt that I’ve inherited,” Courtney explained.
And I’d be lying to you if I told you I didn’t dread Mother’s Day.
‘And then I decided I was going to buy the urn I had been eyeing and bring it home to my mom on Mother’s Day.
“And I had no idea how I was going to afford it.”
Courtney was the oldest of Tammy’s six children and says she considered her mother her best friend.
Addressing his client directly, he said, ‘The $200 you put in that note today allows me to spend Mother’s Day with my mom and I appreciate you so much for that.
“So if you’re there and on TikTok, thank you for the impact you had on my life and I hope you watch this and know that you did something I’ll never forget.”
The video attracted 3.6 million views on the platform and sparked a nationwide search for the Good Samaritan after it was picked up by CBS producers.
“If you ever have a day where you think you don’t matter or you think you don’t have an impact on the world, I would love to be the reminder that yes, you do matter,” Courtney told CBS Mornings.
‘And you will never stop having an impact on the world because I will be able to look at my mantle every day and smile because my mom is looking at me.
“If you’re in Little Rock, if you can come back to Little Rock, if you’re somewhere in the world and you want to be recognized and found, I want to find you.”
“I want to hug you, I want to be able to show that your little moment of kindness created a domino effect of beauty and I need to personally thank you for that.”
