The nicest thing someone's ever done for meIn amongst all the tales of bitterness and poo, we occasionally get fluffy stories that bring a small tear to our internet-jaded eyes.
In celebration of this, what is the nicest thing someone's done for you? Whether you thoroughly deserved it or it came out of the blue, tell us of heartwarming, selfless acts by others.
Failing that, what nice things have you done for other people, whether they liked it or not?
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chthonic, Thu 2 Oct 2008, 16:14)
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And another thingAs a result of the aforesaid stubborn streak I do more for others (not much, but more) than is done for me. The best ever was when I was a wee porky of no more than 19 summers.
At that time I was drifting aimlessly having dropped out of Uni. Through various contacts I ended up running playschemes which kept me in beer. Nice. At one of the schemes I had a lot of kids from less than affluent backgrounds, a rather rough area. My home streets as a matter of fact. Now one of the kids was what we now call cerebral palsied but back then (1978) was simply handicapped or spastic. He was a nice kid though and I took a liking to his rather wry sense of humour. Without letting the other kids suffer I made sure he was included somehow. He was about 9 or 10 but spent most of his time in a McClaren type buggy (his parents couldn’t afford anything fancier and didn’t like the huge wheelchairs). I spent time chatting to his parents at the end of the sessions (hippies, father was a fitter in the shipyards and his mother was what Marge would acknowledge as a homemaker).
One night I was feeling particularly gracious and offered to take the young un of their hands for an afternoon, and did so. It was a Saturday, I picked him up from home and after a warning from his dad to “Not let the little get play up” we went to the beach and visited the fair. Toilet duty wasn’t much fun but we coped. I delivered young un back home and with a total naivete asked “So, what did you get up to this afternoon then?” I actually blushed immediately and started stammering and stuttering. The bairn’s Dad just laughed and said “You know what? We spent this afternoon with the bairn’s sister. We don’t get much time for her and we’ve had a really good time. She said she’d forgotten what it was like to have time with us. Thanks mate.”
So my singular act of kindness turned out to be a bit Pay it Forward. It made me feel good and to be honest this is the first time I’ve thought about it in years. Thanks QOTW for letting me feel good about myself.
Strange the things you do when you’re young and idealistic.
(, Sun 5 Oct 2008, 3:09, Reply)
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