Stories of Kindness from Around the World

Life is Like a Bank Account

This story is about a 92 year old, petite, well-poised and proud lady. She is fully dressed each morning by eight, with her hair fashionable coifed and makeup perfectly applied, even though she is legally blind. She is moving to a nursing home today. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary. After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she maneuvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. "I love it," she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight year old having just been presented with a new puppy. "Mrs. Jones, you haven't seen the room yet.  Just wait." "That doesn't have anything to do with it," she replied. "Happiness is something ... Read Full Story >>

A Crisis Eased by Friends

I have never been huge a fan of change, relishing stability and shying away from the unknown. This last weekend however, instability and uncertaintly came showering down.  However, while it brought unpleasantness, it also made me realize the strength behind a simple phone call, a text message, or a short email. In all the turmoil of the financial markets, my company, one of the leading investment banks, was bought over by a larger bank over the weekend. Now, it has left the employees of our firm unsure of the future.  It feels like an axe just waiting to fall.   I am a worrier by nature, and needless to say these events have left me feeling like the ground beneath my feet has completely shifted.  However, since the news came out on Sunday night, my phone hasn't  stopped ringing with people  asking how I am doing. All my other sources of communication - txt messages, emails and facebook ... Read Full Story >>

Dallas Cowboy's Gift to a Homeless Man

The Dallas Morning News reported a heartwarming story today, for all of us sports fans: A homeless man who goes by Doc was cashing in change at a Cinemark Theatre in Dallas when a guy walked up and offered to pay his way into the movie. He planned to spend his day passing out fliers and accepted a rain check before realizing that he recognized the generous gentleman. "Was that Tony Romo?" Doc asked the worker behind the counter. It sure was. Doc, who requested that his real name not be used, hustled across the street to the consignment store that paid him to occasionally pass out fliers and requested the day off. By the time he got back to the theater, Role Model had already started. Romo, who confirmed the story but didn't want to elaborate, waved Doc over to sit by him and his friend. Doc sheepishly mentioned that he hadn't showered ... Read Full Story >>

Pay-It-Forward Ice Cream Coupons

A long while back, my son and I were having ice-cream at a Baskin Robbins near our home and we decided to "pay it forward" by anonymously treating a dad and his kids to ice-cream.  We left the store before they knew what was going to happen and my son and I smiled to ourselves as we walked home. Well, the other night, as I was reading Darwin's "Voyage of the Beagle", a coupon for a free of pint of Baskin Robbins ice cream fell out of the library book!  Talk about what goes around, comes around.  I didn't say a word to anyone at home, and went about my daily errands.  That day, my son had been particularly helpful (doing things without being asked), so I decided to surprise him with his favorite flavor of ice-cream.  Now, ice-cream is not normally found in our freezer so this is a ... Read Full Story >>

How John Touched My Life

I met him on his birthday when he truned 20 years old.  He was very pleasant and had outstanding, loving eyes.  He reached out his left hand and said, "Nice to meet you."  Nice, indeed. This young man touched my life as well as my heart in the most profound way.  When my husband met him, he felt the same way.  I got to know him very well over the next year as I had the privilege of "working" with him.  See, he got around using a walker or was in a wheelchair and when it was time to get down, or out of his wheelchair he would crawl! John is a shining star to me.  My family just adores him.  He loves talking on the phone, singing, "dancing", noise of any kind, toys that wind up, wiggle or glow, music, cheering, "holding" me while watching tv and his never ending collection of keychains.   It broke ... Read Full Story >>

The Bouncy Ball That Changed Me

This is not a story that describes kindness that I have done but rather kindness that I have received and in a way the kindness that you receive gives energy to the kindness that you show to others. Last night I entered myself into a poetry slam. It was very rushed. Very last minute and I was unprepared. Yet I really wanted to do it. I have wanted to get out and perform one of my poems for a while now. So without the support of my family, I got up in front of a group of people and got ready to present my poem. The slam was a competition but I did not expect to win. Judges were randomly chosen from the audience by having bouncy ball thrown out into their midst to see who would catch them. As it is with most slams performers had 2 minutes to impress ... Read Full Story >>

We Give and We Receive

This morning, as I saw a beautiful garden with gleaming flowers greeting a new shinning sun, I started thinking about the service that we all need and we all offer to each other. Every single thing in this universe is able to produce something for someone else; despite our innate freedom, we all depend on one another. We give and we receive. I thought how those flowers serve bees and other insects by giving them pollen, and with this little act, the little bees can go and produce their honey -served in our breakfast on hot cakes,  and so many other dishes!  When the bees fly around to other places, they take pollen to fertilize other flowers and make them grow. I was thinking about the service we give when, by doing our jobs with joy, we help other people. As an executive, as a milkman, as a doctor, as an office ... Read Full Story >>

Your Time on Stage is Now

Be not afraid of going slowly but afraid of only standing still.     
For the road of life is always under construction

May you not judge each day by what was harvested, but rather what seeds you planted in the universe

Take part in the joy of dreaming
and the wisdom of knowing that you know nothing

Speech is silver and silence is gold, but sometimes, speech is the golden rule.

Your body is the temple where on the inside your life is waiting to awaken
Learn to nourish it so that you may

Appreciate the rainbow after cursing the rain.

Can understand that being busy does not always mean you are truly living

And will have the courage to see that the greatest regret lies in ignoring the truth that your greatest liability could be your greatest asset.

 “Life is but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more"   -- Shakespeare

 

A Lasting Memory of a Temporary Friendship

I met Tovah at Ricky's, an outrageous beauty supply store in Manhattan. There we were waiting patiently to try our hand at costuming. Her motivation, a purim party, mine, costume bowling. As I waited wig-capped and momentarily hairless for the woman behind the counter to bring down the lusty flowing locks of Sassy Suzy, 13-year old Tovah also waited to try on some wigs. She questioned my headdress, or lack thereof. "You have to wear a wig cap to try on the wigs," I said feeling it necessary to explain. "Oh," she said taken aback. "That'll be $2," said the saleswoman to Tovah. "Ooooh, you have to pay for it? I only have enough money for my costume," she replied counting the bills entrusted to her to by mother. "I tell you what," I piped in, "I'll buy it for you." "REALLY???!!! No, really, you will," she exclaimed like she'd just won a ... Read Full Story >>

Hard Lesson From An Unlikely Teacher

     In what now seems like many incarnations ago I was waiting in Bonn Square, Oxford, England, for my wife to return from shopping.  We had an agreement that she would go to the shops while I would browse the wonderful bookstores in the centre of Oxford.  Then at 5 o’clock we’d meet in Bonn Square for a coffee – an arrangement that allowed us to do what we both liked doing best.       On this particular day she was 25 minutes late.  I was beginning to shiver in the crisp November air.  I scanned the square for something to take my mind off my frustration.  My attention was drawn to three people sitting on a bench about 50 feet away.  Two men and a woman.  The men looked as though they were far gone into an alcoholic haze.  Probably, I thought, the three of them were from the homeless person’s ... Read Full Story >>

An Unlikely Buddha

My brother, Patrick is undergoing surgery to give a friend 2/3 of his liver in a live donor program at the University of Minnesota. 

I have a great deal of admiration for him and yet he takes it as, "Just something I am doing for a friend who would die without it."  He is an unlikely Buddha -- Harley riding tatted up and always the rebel -- and he was a perfect match. 

I love you Pat and admire you more than you know.  Pray for his safety.

Every Kid Needs Smarties!

Yesterday my son, daughter and I went to the grocery store.  Ahead of us in line was a little girl with her mother.  The little girl was asking her mother for a box of Smarties.  She was asking very politely and you could see it almost broke the mother's heart when she said, "I'm sorry, Honey, but we just can't afford it." My son was watching that dialogue.  Incidentally, he had been raking leaves in our yard to raise himself some money to buy a treat.   As he watched the mother and daughter leave the store, he ran to the candy counter and grabbed a box of Smarties.   (It turns out that I had also grabbed one pack).   My son proudly placed the Smarties on the conveyor belt, pulled out his money and bought the Smarties.  He turned to look at me and I just nodded.  Out he ran after the ... Read Full Story >>

Goodness Everywhere

This one isn't a commentary on the words of some great philospher, it's not words of wisdom passed down from bygone generations - it's just the story of my morning so far! It's a grey, blustery Wednesday morning here on the west of Scotland. A nothing-much kind-of-day. The plan was, I would take the "weans" to school, walk out to the supermarket, pick up a few things, and then my day could begin. Well the walk to the supermarket takes you, literally, across the forecourt of a Fire Station. As I came up to it I heard sirens. Not fire sirens though.  Two lanes of traffic, car drivers, bus drivers, a truck driver or two, put their journeys on hold and pulled over to the side of the road.  With sirens wailing and blue lights flashing the ambulance tore up the white line in the centre of the road. I caught sight of the ... Read Full Story >>

Gifts for the Elderly

   I came across small single-serving-sized bags of Jelly Beans in the store. My daughter is older and no longer will share treats with her classmates and that is what these bags were intended for. I came up with the idea of still sharing, but with the elderly. So I bought the bag of jelly beans. Because they are individually wrapped, it'll be easy to share with folks at the nursing home.

   Now, my daughter  is making spring flowers and bunnies on cards. We will attach bags of jelly beans to the cards and go hand them out on Saturday or Sunday.  It cost  me less than $3 dollars and will make over 25 people happy.

 Smiles are Contagious  ~ :0) ~Aurelia

Pay It Forward Coffee (Video!)

Just saw this on CNN today:

Perhaps all our collective good karma is impacting the world after all! Keep spreading the goodness, friends.

A Little Sweetness that's Richer than Chocolate!

I thought I would share with all of you my first experience of tagging another person with a smile card which was most memorable for me not only because of what it did for the other person, but also because of how I felt I positively changed in the process. I was taking a class in college that was a somewhat intimidating place to be because it was academically rigorous given that we had weekly quizzes and it was the one class taught by the dean of the university. When it would come time to discover how we performed on those challenging mini-exams, each of us would trudge over to the dean's office with frightened faces to retrieve our quizzes. Fortunately, though, each time we would head over to his office, the tension in our faces would slightly relax a minute before we picked up our exams as we would each be greeted with the kindness of the dean's secretary, the gatekeeper of our quizzes. Cradling a bowl filled with ... Read Full Story >>

Music of a Stolen Symphony

It's a late night on the streets of New York. Larger-than-life size billboards come alive with their glitz, trying to make you want things that you don't really need. Up ahead, I notice a homeless man who doesn't have the things he really does need. Ironic. "Gift size chocolate bar, one dollar, one dollar," he says while showing a candy bar to people walking by. He's rejected. "Just one dollar." Rejected again. "Candy bar, candy bar for you," he shows it to a child walking with her mom. The mom jerks her kid away and moved further. They say that homeless are used to taking rejections, but seeing the charades ahead of me, I couldn't help but feel sorry for him. As I stand next to him, shoulder to shoulder, I pause to see if he will try to sell me ... Read Full Story >>

Late Night in the Company Cab

I was then working in a BPO in the evening shift. It was a tough day for me and was I waiting to go home and sleep. The time was 10pm.  I got into my company cab and was glad to see that I was the only person in it, so that I could reach home in the next 30 minutes. Just then another girl got into the company cab. She told the driver where she wanted to go and it was in the opposite direction to where I was headed. The driver decided to drop me home first as he felt my place was closer to the office and I was happy.  When the company vehicle moved out of my office campus, the other girl got a call on her mobile. From the conversation, I figured out that her husband was not keeping well. She was trying to tell him to eat some light food. ... Read Full Story >>

A Good Deed in My Time of Need

One of the trials of being left behind at the closure of a relationship is all the things that are Left Behind.  Things that must be taken care of  by one or the other of the parties.  In my case,  I would be the one who has to take care of all the things that must be taken care of.  There was no diplomatic division of responsibility -- only me by myself suddenly. I have a  few acres of land a couple of counties away on which I have a minature horse, which Rob so sweetly purchased for my daughter a couple of years ago and which he has now left for me to tend to by myself.    The snow was very bad last week.  Very bad.  And the neighbors' fullsize horses had torn down my little horse's pen and he was running with them.  I couldn't get my vehicle up ... Read Full Story >>

Folded Napkins For Stevie

I try not to be biased, but I had my doubts about hiring Stevie. His placement counselor assured me that he would be a good, reliable busboy.  But I had never had a mentally handicapped employee and wasn't sure I wanted one.  I wasn't sure how my customers would react to Stevie. He was short, a little dumpy with the smooth facial features and thick-tongued speech of Downs Syndrome.  I wasn't worried about most of my trucker customers because truckers don't generally care who buses tables as long as the meatloaf platter is good and the pies are homemade. The four-wheeler drivers were the ones who concerned me; the mouthy college kids traveling to school; the yuppie snobs who secretly polish their silverware with their napkins for fear of catching some dreaded "truck stop germ" the pairs of white-shirted business men on expense accounts who think every truck stop waitress wants to ... Read Full Story >>