Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Day #3 of 40 Random Acts of Kindness before I turned 40: To Make a Difference and Live a Life of Significance

Welcome Back for Day #3 of 40 Random Acts of Kindness:  
My favorite of the forty random acts of kindness happened in the Nashville International Airport.  I was flying to Chicago for my Women’s Unlimited workshop session and had arrived at the airport to find that my flight was delayed.  I decided to go to my favorite airport waiting place, Tootsies.  For those not familiar with Tootsies, it is a bar in Nashville, Tennessee on 422 Broadway.  The airport has a replica of the Tootsie’s Orchid Bar theme and even has a live country music singer there most of the time.  The singer was playing guitar, and it happened to be one of my favorite songs.  There was an elderly couple sitting next to me in the bar and they were very sweet. They were easily in their nineties.  He was drinking a beer, she was picking at a sandwich, and they were both very into the music.  He was tapping his feet and she was moving in her chair to the beat.  They were adorable.  He was wearing a black trucker WWII veteran’s hat with several pins of distinction on it.  This was perfect.  I decided to go to our server and pay for their lunch.  It was close to Veteran’s Day and this was a great opportunity.  I explained to the server that I wanted to pay their tab and her tip.  I told her that when he asked for the bill to explain that his bill had been paid and to thank him for his service.  She gave me the same look to which I was beginning to be accustomed but was very excited to be part of my plot.  It was all set!  I was so excited.  I tried to read my Kindle and appear engaged in my Smartphone.  When he finally asked for his bill, the waitress smiled and took great joy in repeating my request to them.  She told him, thank you for your service.  Puzzled, they begin to look around the restaurant trying to determine who had done this.  I intently and nonchalantly read through my phone messages.  I could overhear them speaking and they began to say to each other about “how nice it was of someone to do this”.  I thought to myself, “It worked”!  Inside I was gleefully thinking about how slick I was when suddenly the wife leaned over to me and said, “You did this, didn’t you?”  Oh no, I was caught!  I lowered my head and said that yes I had but that I didn’t want them to know it was me.  I explained to them that I was turning forty and wanted to do forty nice things or random acts of kindness before I turn forty.  I then began to cry.  I can’t exactly explain why I was crying in the Nashville airport in a Tootsies restaurant bar to an elderly couple, that I didn’t know, but I was.  He looked at me with his weather face, smiled, and thanked me.  Then he said matter-of-factly, “Well, don’t you want to know our story?”  I said that I would love to know their story! He began by taking off his hat and explaining the pins on it, showing me his division.  Certain divisions meant that he was a “flyboy” or pilot in World War II.  He had been stationed in Europe during the war.  This man sitting in front of me had flown 37 bombing missions in Germany against the Nazis and successfully returned home to his bride.  He explained that they had gotten married right before he left for war and that they were about to celebrate 68 years of marriage.  They had been married in November of 1944.  He reached over and began to hold her hand.  Now, I was crying for a different reason.  They talked about how they now lived in Seattle and were traveling to Germany and to the area that he had been stationed all those years ago.  We then talked about how nice the city of Nashville was and how much they loved the music.  I was amazed at their love story and his service for our nation.  They loved my act of kindness and said that it helped them feel better because they were weary from a long day of traveling.  The wife said that she was touched and that she would find a way to do the same for someone else.  She also assured me that even though I was not anonymous, it still counted toward my forty acts of kindness goal.  I left again smiling and beaming.  I never got their name and they never asked for mine but my life was touched by this random encounter.   I received so much more than I gave. 

This goal of mine began to also bleed over into my work.  And I found something else.  When I began to tell my friends and accountability partners about what I was doing they began to do random acts with me.  It was spreading.  Kindness is contagious!  Tomorrow I will tell you about how my intentional goal of significance through kindness began to impact my life, my work, and my results in a positive way. 
Check back tomorrow for Day #4 of 40 Random Acts of Kindness.
~Christy Brasher, Guest Blogger

1 comment:

  1. Christy is such an inspiration to me I have the priviledge of working with her, she has given me such encouragement and has increased my low self esteem to make me want to go back to school and know that I can I am 42 with 1 child at home and a 1 child out and married. I to find my family at the top of my list, but wish to start my 42 acts of kindness today.

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