Stories of Kindness from Around the World

This past weekend, in one of ThankfulTK's always wonderful and informative posts, he wrote about the famous American painter, Winslow Homer, (1821-1896). Since Art History class in college, I had always admired his work and I was fortunate to see an extensive exhibition of his work when I was in my early 30's. It was at this event that I puchased a print on his painting, 'Snap the Whip', shown below. I had it framed and until I retired from teaching it always hung in my classroom. I thought it truly captured the freedom and fun of childhood. These young boys playing this game are not even wearing shoes! During my last year of teaching, there was a young woman In her first year of teaching right next door to me and we got to be good friends. She had been an art student before switching to education, so her eyes were drawn immediately to this print whenever she entered my room. On my last day of teaching, after the students had left, I took the painting off the wall and walked next door and gave it to her. She was really overwhelmed, but very pleased to have it. I was pleased that someone else and all the students she would have would treasure it as much as I had. We found the perfect place for it on one of her walls and hung it together. Thank you, Thankful, for bringing back this wonderful memory for me.