In 1997, I took a six-week temp job that turned into eighteen months. The women that I met there were some of the most fun, nicest women I ever worked with, and it’s where I met Denece, who remains a close friend and someone I respect very much.
Another of the women I worked with was Lana, and one April day I found this little gift from her sitting on my desk:
When I began to write down the random acts of kindness that came my way (beginning with Lana’s), it made me aware of how often during the day people offer such gestures–large and small. It was a good exercise in awareness in a world in which the negative is so often emphasized and discussed rather than the positive.
Shawn Lea at Everything and Nothing blogged that Sunday is Random Acts of Kindness Day, as it apparently is on February 17 of every year. Although I’m posting this late in the day, I’m pretty sure that if we make ourselves look for them, we can see myriad acts of kindness any day, whether they are performed by or directed toward ourselves or others.
When Lisa and Mark were here, they were quiet examples of this. Whether it was setting the table, removing dishes from my hands as I started to wash them, replenishing the pantry and refrigerator after walks to the grocery store, or giving us presents, I was touched again and again by their thoughtfulness.
Among other gifts, Lisa gave me a scarf she knitted in my favorite color combination–green and purple–which you’ll probably see on here one day. And then there was the time I felt beady little eyes looking down at me in my office and glanced up to see:
Lisa’s teasing reminder that the only rodents around The Compound
these days are stuffed and likable.
Then there were the little clues Mark planted in the TimLair for Tim to find after they left, which ended not only in a gift for Tim, but something for me that Mark remembered my talking about in this post all the way back in December of 2006:
Real Beatles cards!
Like all my friends, Mark and Lisa make the world, not just my world, a better place.
very sweet
You’re talking about them, I know, because you are SO not forgiving me for disrespecting BTILC.
Oh I forgive … I just don’t plan on forgetting it
I’d forgotten all about the clue he left in that book until I read this post.
And you made me eat okra. Now, don’t you feel just awful?
(Thanks for everything, a million times, and for liking those little cards so much. Oh, Becky…)
I don’t feel awful at all. Okra is delicious.
Okra is delicious.
Indeed. And I’m Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Wow, have you spent much time talking to Rex? He’s had LOTS of lifetimes and been lots of people, but you probably never heard me discussing that with him. We don’t let many people in on our little secret. Or… was it Rex who inspired Tarzan?!?!?
I guess you didn’t see me going in-and-out of the shower, while I was there. I inspired Tarzan.
Dammit, this is just another reminder that I COVERED MY EYES, isn’t it?
You missed nothing. I couldn’t even inspire Baltimora. Everybody knows who the real Tarzan Boy at that table was. : )
Okra is delicious. Was it fried, boiled or pickled?
Dave doesn’t eat okra, so far that is his only fatal flaw.
Fried. And fresh, not frozen.
Mmm that is the BEST. I have learned to like it boiled. The secret is adding some vinegar to the water when you boil it. And pickled okra is a treat I give myself occasionally.
Thanks for the reminder of Random Acts Of Kindness day. I keep a small poster from last years on my desk, but was home from work today.
Unrelated to your post, I found you researching my favorite ‘author’ Timothy James Beck to see what was coming up next. I had noticed that LJ was in the acknowledgements in the most recent novel, but didn’t realize some of you were members! I don’t comment much, but I will be reading.
And thank you (and the rest of the TJB team)for 5 amazing books that I have thoroughly enjoyed and re-read often.
Thank YOU, Andrew, for your kind words [making this an act of kindness from you to me, so it IS related to my post =)].
I’m so glad you enjoyed the TJB books.
I like okra. But I also like liver and onions.
When I was pregnant with my oldest daughter I ate tons of deep fried battered okra. But what isn’t good battered and deep fried? Heck, they even deep fry candy bars don’t they. lol.
That’s pretty much what I said to Lisa and Mark when I was cooking the okra: “If you batter and fry a piece of bark, it’s good.”
Yes, the world is certainly a better place for all those who know that kindness costs nothing and benefits both giver and receiver.
“A Kindness Journal” is one of those wonderful things you can keep looking back on for wonderful memories, too . . .