Random Acts of Kindness

I love the bumper sticker "Practice random acts of kindness and senseless beauty." On December 26, which is the second to the last week of the year and of course the week of Christmas, I found my fifty-first new experience. I wanted to do something giving, not only to go along with the holiday, but because I felt it would be a good addition to my book.

Originally I wanted to volunteer at a soup kitchen. It didn't work out and I knew it wouldn't because I didn't give myself enough time to plan ahead. All the soup kitchens I called were full of volunteers. So I came up with a plan b. My friend Heidi was visiting from California and told me she wanted to join me on this week's adventure.

We went to a nice fast food restaurant, ordered something tasty for ourselves, then each put down a ten dollar bill and told the cashier we'd like to pay for whoever comes after us. We were a little nervous because we didn't know if we'd even be allowed to do this. At least, I was a little nervous about it, even though it might sound ridiculous. The cashier just smiled and said, "You're so cute," and told us about someone who recently went through the drive through and said he wanted to pay for the people in the vehicle behind him; this couple consequently decided to pay for the couple behind them.

Even after the cashier's story, I guess I just pictured the next customers to walk inside the store, but it was a while before anyone came in and when they did, it was two men in business suits and we didn't notice any particular reaction. After we finished our own meal at about noon, we asked the cashier what had happened. The couple after us were in the drive through, which we hadn't considered probably because you typically don't think first about the people who are least visible. When they were told their meal had already been paid for, the cashier told us they looked like they were about to cry. It really touched us, and of course, neither pair knew who the other was or even what they looked like or anything about them, but it didn't matter. It really made our day, and hopefully we made someone else's too.