A broken, worn out memory

In my line of work as a reporter I get to meet a lot of people. Some make you jealous and others you pity. But its always the ones that I pity that seem to teach me a lesson, which is probably the reason Christians struggle to help those of us who are less fortunate.
Anyway, today I went to visit a struggling family that my newspaper has been trying to help out.
During Hurricane Rita this family lost their mobile home, most of their belongings and their sole sorce of transportation: a truck that overheated during their 18-hour exodus from Houston and disappeared from the spot where they had left it. Needless to say they are starting from scratch.
But you wouldn't know that by looking at the mother/wife. When my editor and I showed up to their squalid hotel room, her eyes seemed troubled but happy -- kind of like a minimum wage couple that just found they are going to have triplets. They were full of muffled enthuiasm. As we walked into the room, which smelled like a wet, old book -- and was just as aesthetic -- she greeted us with a slight hint of shame.
Her 6-year-old son as just the same. In his face you could see a world of worry. His big,brown eyes didn't do much to conceal his pain. In fact they seemed to only reflect his misery more clearly, like the confused glare of a punished puppy. He couldn't figure out what he had done to deserve this. Nor could I. Behind his downcast eyes I could see a boy that worried about his family; a boy that worried more about their happiness than his own.
It broke my heart.
His only oasis from the scorching reality of poverty was a worn out game controller held together by electrical tape. It was one of those controllers that contains three of the old games, like Pac-Man or Donkey Kong. It stood as the only toy he had gotten this Christmas. Amid all the packages we brought the family there were no toys, nothing to take his mind off his day to day struggles -- which I would guess are a heavier burden than anybody his age deserves.
That's when I wished I hadn't thrown away that old Nintendo 64. That ancient machine was something that I haven't been interested in in years. And something he has always wanted.