Your Kindness Can - And Should - Ripple Through This World
Even my 5-year-old son, who has been counting the days until Christmas since Valentines Day, was shocked. It was only a few days after Halloween and there at the mall, Christmas decorations were already up and hanging for the seven-week wait.
“What happened to Thanksgiving?” He wanted to know, thoroughly believing in his little pre-school mind that they must have forgotten to put it on the calender this year.
I assured him that Thanksgiving would still come, whether the mall thought it should or not. Then he asked me about the money bells.
Money bells?
He sighed like an exasperated teenager. “The people who ring the bells and we put money in the red pots. Where are they?”
He remembered taking change out of his piggy bank for whenever we went Christmas shopping and saw the Salvation Army bell ringers. I was proud of him for remembering the spirit of giving and not just what he wanted from Santa this year.
It may be a cliche, but it is true: It feels so much better to give than to get.
It frustrates me that, being a family with several small children, we aren’t able to give as much as our generous family and friends give to us. But there are so many ways to give other than a check or a wrapped gift. I can take a lesson from one of my bosses - yes, you read that right - who is a giver in every sense of the word.
Not only has Mary Quinn-Hurst been generous to me personally - with her gifts, her kind words, her willingness to answer my questions with genuine concern, and her flexibility - but she also gives to the children in this community whenever the opportunity arises.
As a pediatric occupational therapist, she has offered to go to the home of a family with infant triplets for an evaluation so as to spare them for the stress and inconvenience of coming to her office. She is involved in every child advocacy group I’m aware of and feels she’s working for the children and not a paycheck.
Some of her patients come from unimaginable social situations. Sometimes, she speaks the only kind words they hear.
One substance-abusing mother who was in treatment came to see Quinn-Hurst with her newborn baby. The mother was reassured by the small fact that Quinn-Hurst had commented on how nicely the mom had wrapped her baby. That simple gesture made a great difference to her confidence.
I would be better off if I learned just one of the giving traits in my lifetime that Quinn-Hurst possesses every day.
Giving can be just like that - a kind word, a smile, a gesture such as holding the door for someone whose hands are full or letting another car into your lane without its becoming an Olympic contest. It is impossible to know what kind of day the other person has had, or what kind of life.
A small act of kindness may turn someone’s day around. Maybe they’ll be kind to someone else because of it.
Before I shun the kids having a car wash to raise money for a chemotherapy patient, I have to remember that I am not immune to tragedy. Someday I might need the kindness of strangers. It’s OK to give without getting. It’s the best kind of giving there is.
Three years ago, when our family changed health insurance companies, the new company imposed a three-month waiting period for coverage on a pre-existing condition that I had. Literally hours before the coverage took effect, I suffered a near fatal allergic reaction to an over-the-counter medication and was taken by ambulance to Holy Family Hospital.
The insurance company wouldn’t waive the three remaining hours of the waiting period, and we tried to work with Holy Family’s accounts receivable department to make payment arrangements on the $9OO that we now owed the hospital.
Shortly thereafter, I received a letter from the hospital. I expected it to spell out how much my payments would be. Instead, the hospital had written off the entire amount. Our balance was now zero.
Someday, I will be able to give back to Holy Family for the kindness it showed my family in unusual circumstances. But for now, I hope, giving what we can, when we can, will make it back to them in some way or another.
Start the ripple effect. Sow a seed of kindness when you give of your time, your efforts, your money or a kind gesture. Those who receive will give in return, and so on. And someday, it will come back to you.
xxxx
The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Michae’l Alegria, Contributing writer