About 25 years ago, a man stopped on the highway to help my friend and me when our car had broken down. We were in rural upstate New York on a Sunday far from pretty much anything. He looked at the car, figured out what was wrong, drove us to the home of the owner of the nearest auto parts store, had him open up his shop, found the part we needed, drove us back to our car, fixed it, and about three hours after we had broken down, we were on our way. Only accepting our thanks, he made us promise we would help someone else in the same way.
In the years that have passed since that time, I have tried to keep that promise. Sometimes it is easy to be kind to strangers; hold the door for the person in front, let a car ahead in traffic, write a check for a charity. But it is far easier to rationalize why there isn't time, or money, or reason to be kind. I'm in a hurry, I can't possibly let that car pull out ahead of me. I'm not sure if I will have enough money at the end of the month to donate to the charity with the booth outside the grocery store.
This blog is an attempt to keep that promise, 25 years later. The plan is to commit an act of kindness every day, for the next 365 days. My hope is that, in a year, it will become a way of life rather something I do every once in a while. The reason for writing about it simply to keep me honest. If I have to write it down, I have to do it. So here goes...starting tomorrow.
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