grace for all - Gingerbread Street

In a time long gone by, a young boy by the name of Thomas lived with his mother in their rather shabby and run-down house. Thomas’ father had died from small pox and had left him and his mother with very little. There was little in the way of money and so little food or anything nice at all.
The house was in Gingerbread Street, which despite the sweet-sounding name was a rather gloomy place. It consisted of just two rooms - a bedroom where the bed was hidden away in a cupboard and a room at the front of the house that served as living area and kitchen and had a door which opened straight out on to the street. In that main room there was an open fireplace, the only source of light and heat where everything was dark - brown walls and a dusty old brick floor.
Local children would play games of ‘ring-a-ring-of-roses’ along Gingerbread Street and recently a number of the children had become ill - some had dropped down dead right there in the street.
The feather mattress Thomas slept on was rather lumpy and he would toss and turn uncomfortably at night with just a thin blanket to keep him warm. In his dreams he dreamed of one day becoming wealthy. There was a particularly well-dressed man that walked past him each day as he sold newspapers on the street corner and he would dream what it would be like to be rich and not so very poor.
But although Thomas and his mother were so poor they were still happy inside their hearts. Thomas’ mother believed that there was a God in heaven that loved them.