Yahoo News Bus Driver Buys Clothes for Boy Who Didn’t Have PJs to Wear for Pajama Day After Seeing Him Crying
"No child should have to miss out on something as small as pajama day,” the bus driver said
Jefferson County Public Schools
Larry Farrish Jr.To one little kid, his bus driver is his hero.
Kentucky bus driver Larry Farrish Jr., 35, went above and beyond to help a first grader named Levi at Engelhard Elementary School cheer up after he had been having a bad day on Friday, Feb. 9, according to a Jefferson County Public Schools press release.
Farrish Jr., 35 told Today that when he came to pick up the little boy he had been in a downhearted mood, which was unlike him, so he asked him about it.
“Normally when I pull up, he’s standing there waiting for me with a big smile, but on this day, he was sitting on the ground with a jacket over his head,” Farrish Jr. told the outlet. “I asked him, ‘Hey buddy, what’s going on? What’s wrong?’”
That’s when the little boy, who had “a face full of tears,” told him that he didn’t have any pajamas, so he couldn’t participate in Pajama Day.
“I thought, ‘I gotta fix this,” he told Today, adding in the news release, “It hurt me so bad. That just wasn’t my Levi, and I wanted him to have a good day. No child should have to miss out on something as small as pajama day.”
Jefferson County Public Schools
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Once he finished making his rounds, Farrish Jr. decided to stop by his local Family Dollar store and purchase “a few pairs of pajamas in various sizes” for the boy, per the school. He brought the pajamas into the school’s office and asked the staff if they could call Levi down.
“It really turned the whole Friday around, for him and for me,” he said in the news release.
Levi said in the release that he was thankful for his bus driver for doing a kind deed. “I can tell Mr. Larry is nice and his heart is filled with joy,” he said. “I’m usually really happy, but not on pajama day…When he got me the pajamas, I did a happy cry.”
Farrish Jr. became a bus driver seven years ago after having worked as a corrections officer and a truck driver, and told Today that it has been the most fulfilling job he’s had so far.
“They become my kids after they leave their parents,” Farrish told school officials. “I make sure they get to and from school safe, but I also try to bring some type of joy to their lives.”
After Jefferson County Public Schools shared on social media what happened, Farrish Jr. said he was inundated with several “touching” messages from the community. He said several people even reached out to him to let him know the impact he’s had on their own children’s lives.
“For people to actually be able to find me and reach out on behalf of such a small gesture, it made me cry,” Farrish Jr. said. “It feels good knowing I made an impact on a child’s life.”
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