--YOU DON’T KNOW IT, BUT YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE IN
THE MIDDLE OF MY SCREEN
…That’s me and my nephew, Lucas, who is a New
Year’s baby and turns two in a little over a month. He’s a doll, and I love him so much, and I
think he loves me some back, which is a wonderful thing.
...Did you have a great Thanksgiving? Was there lots of sunshine and laughter? I hope so. I'm celebrating Thanksgiving today.
…This tweet is sweet but made me a little weepy:
“Today, I operated on a little girl who needed O-
blood. We didn’t have any, but her twin
brother has O- blood. I explained to him
that this was life and death. He sat
quietly for a moment then said goodbye to his parents. I didn’t think anything of it until after we
took his blood and he asked, 'So when will I die?' He thought he was giving his life for hers." –Dr.
Katherine Pulaski, surgeon
…This made me happy:
…Lastly, I loved this so much:
Bookstore employee writes
this on Facebook after “little old lady” shocks everyone at the register
I work in a decent sized, local, indie bookstore. It’s a great job 99% of the
time and a lot of our customers are pretty neat people. Anywho, middle of the
day this little old lady comes up. She’s lovably kooky. She effuses how much
she loves the store and how she wishes she could spend more time in it but her
husband is waiting in the car ‘OH! I BETTER BUY HIM SOME CHOCOLATE!’ She piles
a bunch of art supplies on the counter and then stops and tells me how my bangs
are beautiful and remind her of the ocean (‘Wooooosh’ she says, making a wave
gesture with her hand.
Ok. I think to myself. Awesomely happy, weird little old ladies are my
favourite kind of customer. They’re thrilled about everything and they’re
comfortably bananas. I can have a good time with this one. So we chat and it’s
nice.
Then this kid, who’s been up my
counter a few times to gather his school textbooks, comes up in line behind her
(we’re connected to a major university in the city so we have a lot of harried
students pass through). She turns around to him and, out of nowhere, demands
that he put his textbooks on the counter. He’s confused but she explains that she’s
going to buy his textbooks.
He goes sheetrock white. He refuses and adamantly insists that she can’t do
that. It’s like, $400 worth of textbooks. She, this tiny old woman, boldly
takes them out of his hands, throws them on the counter and turns to me with an
intense stare and tells me to put them on her bill. The kid at this point is
practically in tears. He’s confused and shocked and grateful. Then she turns to
him and says ‘you need chocolate.’ She starts grabbing handfuls of chocolates
and putting them in her pile.
He keeps asking her ‘why are you doing this?’ She responds ‘Do you like Harry
Potter?’ and throws a copy of the new Cursed Child on the pile too.
Finally she’s done and I ring
her up for a crazy amount of money. She pays and asks me to please give the kid
a few bags for his stuff. While I’m bagging up her merchandise the kid hugs
her. We’re both telling her how amazing she is and what an awesome thing she’s
done. She turns to both of us and says probably one of the most profound,
unscripted things I’ve ever had someone say:
‘It’s important to be kind. You can’t know all the times that you’ve hurt
people in tiny, significant ways. It’s easy to be cruel without meaning to be.
There’s nothing you can do about that. But you can choose to be kind. Be kind.’
The kid thanks her again and
leaves. I tell her again how awesome she is. She’s staring out the door after
him and says to me: ‘My son is a homeless meth addict. I don’t know what I did.
I see that boy and I see the man my son could have been if someone had chosen
to be kind to him at just the right time.’
I’ve bagged up all her stuff
and at this point am super awkward and feel like I should say something but I
don’t know what. Then she turns to me and says: ‘I wish I could have bangs like
that but my darn hair is just too curly.’ And leaves. And that is the story of
the best customer I’ve ever had. Be kind to somebody today.
