Originally posted by: DainBramaged
haha...if I were the cashier, I would charge them both.:evil:
lol :-D
lol :-D
A++ thread.
Not exactly a random act of kindness, but a few weekends ago I was visting one of my long time female friends. She needed help moving out of her current place, and into her mom's house, and I was bored that weekend, so I went and helped her for a few days. Her mom's place has a huge yard, and most of it went unmowed for the entire winter and spring, so it was around 2 to 3 feet high. When my friend and her mom went to do the final cleaning on her apartment, I spent around three hours using a 12 year old 3.5HP mower and an electric weed eater cutting down all the grass in the backyard. I don't think either of them could have managed to do this, especially with the equipment that they had.
When they got back, her mom was so happy, she started crying. I guess she had been working on cutting the lawn for four weeks now, but had to stop because she started having back pains and such.
I really felt good about helping them out.
Not exactly a random act of kindness, but a few weekends ago I was visting one of my long time female friends. She needed help moving out of her current place, and into her mom's house, and I was bored that weekend, so I went and helped her for a few days. Her mom's place has a huge yard, and most of it went unmowed for the entire winter and spring, so it was around 2 to 3 feet high. When my friend and her mom went to do the final cleaning on her apartment, I spent around three hours using a 12 year old 3.5HP mower and an electric weed eater cutting down all the grass in the backyard. I don't think either of them could have managed to do this, especially with the equipment that they had.
When they got back, her mom was so happy, she started crying. I guess she had been working on cutting the lawn for four weeks now, but had to stop because she started having back pains and such.
I really felt good about helping them out.
shortylickens
No Lifer
- Jul 15, 2003
- 80,287
- 17,081
- 136
+ +
THE STORY OF SHORTYLICKENS:
All right, I'll share. This is not a made up story, it actually happened to me.
When I was in the Navy, I got stationed at a small shore command for my final tour. Generally at small bases you have a home-town feel where people look out for each other and get along well.
That was not the case here. There was a feeling of hostility up and down the chain of command, civilians were not always treated well either.
Alchohol problems were constant, especially bar fights.
In the Navy we have this program called MWR. Morale, Welfare and Recreation.
Its run by civilians and sometimes they get help from sailors to get projects done. But mostly its there for the benefit of sailors, so they can have fun with a minimum of effort and money.
They run the on base bowling and gym, and things like the pizzaria, camping equipment rental and any other odd little things related to sailor recreation.
Sometimes even tickets for trips or major league games.
At this particular base, they didnt recieve much funding and had to charge an aweful lot for tickets. Sailor rarely participated and many events never even got off the ground. Their job was to improve morale and they couldnt, some people on base even disliked them because of it.
However there was nice little civilian who worked for MWR and worked well. She never complained, always tried to come up with new ideas for fun on and off base, and even took abuse from her many bosses with a pretty healthy attitude.
Her name was Courtney.
After she had been working with us for about 6 miserable months, tragedy struck her. Her folks were driving along one of the most dangerous stretches of highway in southern california (not to mention the entire US) and they had an accident. I dont remember all the details after so many years, but I do know that her mother was killed instantly and her dad was labeled "expectant" immediatly upon arrival at the hospital. Apparently, the doctor was one of those who didnt like losing patients. He fought to keep the old man alive and the old man fought to stay alive. After a long surgery the status was raised to Critical. Things didnt look good at all but he somehow hung on. He was in critical care for weeks and after a month or so was sent home.
During this episode, Courtney was a wreck. Her friends and coworkers tried to console her, but it didnt help much. She managed to get through it without losing her sanity, but she was not the same person afterwards.
Around the time her dad got out, they were making arrangements to bury her mom. Now I knew damn well that a funeral would cost her a lot of money and I sure couldnt help her with it. But I knew I had an oppertunity to make her life better, and I took it.
I went to the bank, withdrew 300 bucks in 50's and slipped it in a plain envelope, along with a note suggesting she use it to help with her travel expenses and such. Slipped it on her desk later that evening, when I knew she wouldnt be around.
Briefly thought about sharing my name, but I knew she would want to give it back. For the same reason I thought it best to not share news of my actions with anybody else.
The moral of the story is: It felt nice to help somebody out. Especially when its a nice person that deserves help.
THE STORY OF SHORTYLICKENS:
All right, I'll share. This is not a made up story, it actually happened to me.
When I was in the Navy, I got stationed at a small shore command for my final tour. Generally at small bases you have a home-town feel where people look out for each other and get along well.
That was not the case here. There was a feeling of hostility up and down the chain of command, civilians were not always treated well either.
Alchohol problems were constant, especially bar fights.
In the Navy we have this program called MWR. Morale, Welfare and Recreation.
Its run by civilians and sometimes they get help from sailors to get projects done. But mostly its there for the benefit of sailors, so they can have fun with a minimum of effort and money.
They run the on base bowling and gym, and things like the pizzaria, camping equipment rental and any other odd little things related to sailor recreation.
Sometimes even tickets for trips or major league games.
At this particular base, they didnt recieve much funding and had to charge an aweful lot for tickets. Sailor rarely participated and many events never even got off the ground. Their job was to improve morale and they couldnt, some people on base even disliked them because of it.
However there was nice little civilian who worked for MWR and worked well. She never complained, always tried to come up with new ideas for fun on and off base, and even took abuse from her many bosses with a pretty healthy attitude.
Her name was Courtney.
After she had been working with us for about 6 miserable months, tragedy struck her. Her folks were driving along one of the most dangerous stretches of highway in southern california (not to mention the entire US) and they had an accident. I dont remember all the details after so many years, but I do know that her mother was killed instantly and her dad was labeled "expectant" immediatly upon arrival at the hospital. Apparently, the doctor was one of those who didnt like losing patients. He fought to keep the old man alive and the old man fought to stay alive. After a long surgery the status was raised to Critical. Things didnt look good at all but he somehow hung on. He was in critical care for weeks and after a month or so was sent home.
During this episode, Courtney was a wreck. Her friends and coworkers tried to console her, but it didnt help much. She managed to get through it without losing her sanity, but she was not the same person afterwards.
Around the time her dad got out, they were making arrangements to bury her mom. Now I knew damn well that a funeral would cost her a lot of money and I sure couldnt help her with it. But I knew I had an oppertunity to make her life better, and I took it.
I went to the bank, withdrew 300 bucks in 50's and slipped it in a plain envelope, along with a note suggesting she use it to help with her travel expenses and such. Slipped it on her desk later that evening, when I knew she wouldnt be around.
Briefly thought about sharing my name, but I knew she would want to give it back. For the same reason I thought it best to not share news of my actions with anybody else.
The moral of the story is: It felt nice to help somebody out. Especially when its a nice person that deserves help.
i learned to juggle 2-3 years ago. At the time I was staying with my mom and we were out grocery shopping. I'd be walking down the aisles juggling for practice or whatever. There was a small child who was crying about something or other so I walked up and started juggling in front of him. Kid thought it was fantastic and started laughing.
Not sure if that qualifies as an act of "kindness" but my mom thought it was super nice
FK
Not sure if that qualifies as an act of "kindness" but my mom thought it was super nice
FK
I give everyone money who asks me for some if I have any on my person.
I'm just going to spend it on the same things they are. :laugh:
I've owned/raced a few Honda CRXs in the past. Anytime I see one on the side of the road with the hood up I always pull over to help.
So far, I'm 5-0 for getting them back on their way
... and to reverse the good fortune... back in like '96 or so I was driving my girlfriend back to Virginia Tech. Was driving in her mom's Volvo station wagon because it was larger than a CRX (obviously) and there was a ton of stuff to take back. Halfway back and the car takes a dump. This was not the age of cell phones. I counted over 100 cars that passed me on a not-so-busy road before an Explorer pulled over. It was VMI's men's basketball coach. He called a few people, got me a tow, even bought me dinner and kept me company until some random mechanic fixed it and I was on my way.
So far, I'm 5-0 for getting them back on their way
... and to reverse the good fortune... back in like '96 or so I was driving my girlfriend back to Virginia Tech. Was driving in her mom's Volvo station wagon because it was larger than a CRX (obviously) and there was a ton of stuff to take back. Halfway back and the car takes a dump. This was not the age of cell phones. I counted over 100 cars that passed me on a not-so-busy road before an Explorer pulled over. It was VMI's men's basketball coach. He called a few people, got me a tow, even bought me dinner and kept me company until some random mechanic fixed it and I was on my way.
Don't know how you count this, but on Tuesday, an exchange student came up to me on the street and asked me the way to the Library. <Weird thing is someone else asked me the same thing just Monday.> After I told him and kept going, we are walking the same way, so he comes up to me suddenly to ask me for help on his English homework. It was just basic fill in the blank sentence finisher, so I "helped" him out with it. Now I'm wondering if I aided him educationally or not.
Hope this helps me karma-wise, since I pretty much just screwed over my supervisor whom I really didn't and don't want to give the shaft to. ~Stupid University scheduled a mandatory course in the middle of summer 200km away in the middle of nowhere, so I need two weeks leave. Didn't say anything earlier to HR before hiring since there were 50 applicants, 25 positions and guarantee a big F U to those who couldn't stay every day of the summer.
Hope this helps me karma-wise, since I pretty much just screwed over my supervisor whom I really didn't and don't want to give the shaft to. ~Stupid University scheduled a mandatory course in the middle of summer 200km away in the middle of nowhere, so I need two weeks leave. Didn't say anything earlier to HR before hiring since there were 50 applicants, 25 positions and guarantee a big F U to those who couldn't stay every day of the summer.
SearchMaster
Diamond Member
- Jun 6, 2002
- 7,791
- 114
- 106
I've probably changed a half-dozen tires for people on the side of the road. It makes me feel really good when I show up at work or at home and have to go through the 5 minutes of hand-washing to get the muck off . The last lady was obviously a housekeeper of some sort based on all the cleaning equipment in the back of her barely roadworthy Ford Escort. She insisted on paying me, I finally just told her to pay it forward and the next time she found someone in need to remember this moment and help them out. She gave me a hug with tears in her eyes and drove off. I smiled all the way home (where my dinner was now cold ).
. The last lady was obviously a housekeeper of some sort based on all the cleaning equipment in the back of her barely roadworthy Ford Escort. She insisted on paying me, I finally just told her to pay it forward and the next time she found someone in need to remember this moment and help them out. She gave me a hug with tears in her eyes and drove off. I smiled all the way home (where my dinner was now cold ).Hm... I do little stuff all the time. Things such as letting people into the lane I'm driving when there's a lot of traffic, or holding the door for people, smiling and asking how are you... and etc.
This one I'm saying for Rakkis (also comes on ATOT but is driving to Indiana from LA for temporary residence). He was driving to his scuba instructors house to pick up something and as he arrived nearby the instructors house, he noticed an individual on the ground. Keep in mind that this is Malibu, CA and so he thought to himself, "wait a minute, there are no bums in Malibu...". Turns out that it was an old man that was having difficulty breathing and needed medical attention badly or else he was a goner. Rakkis called the instructor to come over, the instructor then started performing mouth-to-mouth recessitation Rakkis called 911. As they were waiting for the ambulance and with the instructor still performing the mouth-to-mouth, Rakkis was feeling for the old man's pulse and found that it was fading until eventually there was no more pulse. With much haste, Rakkis then performed CPR on the old man until the ambulance arrived with the defribrillator, which the defribrillator was then used on the old man bringing him back into a more stable condition. Rakkis just had dinner with the old guy with the new pace maker a few weeks ago and the guy seems to be doing fine except for the broken ribs done by the initiation of the CPR.
This one I'm saying for Rakkis (also comes on ATOT but is driving to Indiana from LA for temporary residence). He was driving to his scuba instructors house to pick up something and as he arrived nearby the instructors house, he noticed an individual on the ground. Keep in mind that this is Malibu, CA and so he thought to himself, "wait a minute, there are no bums in Malibu...". Turns out that it was an old man that was having difficulty breathing and needed medical attention badly or else he was a goner. Rakkis called the instructor to come over, the instructor then started performing mouth-to-mouth recessitation Rakkis called 911. As they were waiting for the ambulance and with the instructor still performing the mouth-to-mouth, Rakkis was feeling for the old man's pulse and found that it was fading until eventually there was no more pulse. With much haste, Rakkis then performed CPR on the old man until the ambulance arrived with the defribrillator, which the defribrillator was then used on the old man bringing him back into a more stable condition. Rakkis just had dinner with the old guy with the new pace maker a few weeks ago and the guy seems to be doing fine except for the broken ribs done by the initiation of the CPR.
:thumbsup:
I've got another. When my oldest boy was 1 1/2 we flew from Seattle to Minneapolis. We had never flown with a child before (obviously). On some advice from a friend we gave him some Benadryl to make him sleeepy. This only made him more cranky. He started kicking the seat if front of us and throwing a fit. I tried to carry him around the airplane but the stewardess told me we had to return to our seats. No matter what we did we could not settle our son down, he was kicking and screaming and crying. The stewardesses made absolutely no attempt to help and wouldn't even look our way. Finally some middle aged lady came up and knelt in the aisle beside my son (even though the fasten seat belt sign was on) and started talking to him, she had been visiting her nephew and had a bunch of toys and stuff in her bag. She knelt there and played and talked to him the entire flight. Obviously we were very grateful (as was the person sitting in front of my son)!! It was like somebody put an angel on that flight to look over my son, what a nice lady! Needless to say we did things much differently on the return trip - no Benadryl and a HUGE bag of new toys.
sygyzy
Lifer
- Oct 21, 2000
- 14,001
- 4
- 76
Great thread. Have any of you seen that insurance (?) commmercial where one act of kindness sets off a whole string of them?
Edit: Found it. Liberty Mutual via YouTube
Edit: Found it. Liberty Mutual via YouTube
I think you did a very good job. That would be a true random act of kindness.
---
Cynicist in me tries to analyze the situation from OP
While all the people who posted their stories definitely had a good intent in mind and did the best, are we forgetting the line between what is ethical, what is being responsible person and what is committing a random act of kindness (RAK) ? For example, from my perspective, RAK, would only be qualified if the person who gets the help has no idea where that help came from OR if the giver does not know the person.
For example, people paying at the Starbucks...yes, that would be a perfect RAK, since possibility of meeting the giver is very slim.
From my perspective, holding door or helping elderly are either socially accepted etiquettes or social responsibilities (that means you are not forced to do it, but you do it anyways because from your own judgement you feel like it's the right thing to do).
Finally, research has shown helping people and committing RAK especially induces extra release of dopamine (brain stimulant), a chemical that makes you feel good. That's why you feel better when you help someone.
As for my RAK, they are small compared what other people here have done...
cKGunslinger
Lifer
- Nov 29, 1999
- 16,408
- 57
- 91
I guess I can wade through the dozens of emo thread with kids cursing their parents, controlling their GF, or stealing someone wallet just to read good stuff like this. :thumbsup:
OK, just one more....
Several years ago my father in law had a heart attack in the middle of a street near a construction site. His best friend, who knew CPR, froze and just stood there staring at him unable to move. Two strangers, a telephone lineman and a forklift driver working nearby, ran over and performed CPR until paramedics arrived. He lived several more pretty good years after that including getting to see his daughter's wedding a few months later.
Since I have kids I am always alert and watching when mom's (mostly, sometimes dads) need a hand out in public, shopping, etc... I've caught shopping carts that started to roll away with an infant in them as their parent was putting groceries in the car, held a ladies check book down for her as she was struggling trying to write a check and hold a baby at the same time, etc.... And people have done the same for my wife in similar situations.
Several years ago my father in law had a heart attack in the middle of a street near a construction site. His best friend, who knew CPR, froze and just stood there staring at him unable to move. Two strangers, a telephone lineman and a forklift driver working nearby, ran over and performed CPR until paramedics arrived. He lived several more pretty good years after that including getting to see his daughter's wedding a few months later.
Since I have kids I am always alert and watching when mom's (mostly, sometimes dads) need a hand out in public, shopping, etc... I've caught shopping carts that started to roll away with an infant in them as their parent was putting groceries in the car, held a ladies check book down for her as she was struggling trying to write a check and hold a baby at the same time, etc.... And people have done the same for my wife in similar situations.
I forgot to mention this in my earlier post, but this happened to me 2 years back.
One of my friends colleagues had come to US for a short term project (like 3 months). I had never known him before until I had met him here in US. He seemed like a nice guy and he was very friendly.
A few days go by and one day he gets a call from his house that his mom had passed away. Once we got this news, we wanted to fly him back to India ASAP. The problem was there were no tickets available at that time (peak holiday season). And the ones that were available were priced at $4500 one way (normal round trip costs $1000).
He did not have the money to buy the tickets and was trying desperately to get in touch with his company to arrange some funds, so that he could buy the tickets, unfortunately for him it was a Saturday.
I decided to step forward and buy the tickets for him. Because of that, he was able to take an earlier flight out of US and reach in time for the funeral. Had he missed the flight, he would have missed the funeral and a chance to see his mom one last time before she would be cremated.
After the funeral, he returned me back the money for the tickets.
One of my friends colleagues had come to US for a short term project (like 3 months). I had never known him before until I had met him here in US. He seemed like a nice guy and he was very friendly.
A few days go by and one day he gets a call from his house that his mom had passed away. Once we got this news, we wanted to fly him back to India ASAP. The problem was there were no tickets available at that time (peak holiday season). And the ones that were available were priced at $4500 one way (normal round trip costs $1000).
He did not have the money to buy the tickets and was trying desperately to get in touch with his company to arrange some funds, so that he could buy the tickets, unfortunately for him it was a Saturday.
I decided to step forward and buy the tickets for him. Because of that, he was able to take an earlier flight out of US and reach in time for the funeral. Had he missed the flight, he would have missed the funeral and a chance to see his mom one last time before she would be cremated.
After the funeral, he returned me back the money for the tickets.
ModeEngage
Senior member
True, I guess I think it's 'stupid' because I'm reasonably certain it will never happen to me. Sorry, didn't mean to turn anything political.
- May 18, 2001
- 7,869
- 361
- 126
Me too... it has turned out better than I anticipated. Surely there are more stories??? How about some people pledging to do a specific act this weekend?
I usually open the door for people behind me and try to smile and say hello to people i pass on campus. At supermarkets i almost always ask the older people if they would like help putting thier groceries into their cars especially there is soda at the bottom. I used to be a sacker at a grocery store so i guess this is where that came from.
Did a minor one yesterday. A guy broke down on the freway offramp (westbound 22 at Harbor). I parked and ran up to help push him into the Jack in the Box parking lot so he could take his time sorting things out.
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