Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Kindness seems like a basic concept but somehow it is lacking in the world we currently live in. Everyone has their nose in their cell phone and rarely looks up to notice if there might be someone near them in need. I know if you live in any large city in the United States, you see homelessness and people holding signs and asking for help, honestly most of us ignore them and I am as guilty as anyone.

There is a saying “No act of Kindness, no matter how small, is never wasted.” I realized that today, I am a generally nice person. I hold doors and greet people with genuine friendliness, too many times I have a joke or comment about something or nothing at all that I have zero compunction sharing. Today, like any other day I stopped to get gas and I noticed a guy sitting on the curb with a gas can, not asking for anything, just quietly sitting. I asked if he was waiting on someone, and he told me that he was out of gas and was just trying to figure out how he was going to get some because he only has a couple dollars. Filling up his 1-gallon gas can wasn’t going to break me, so I waved him over and filled it up. He thanked me and walked over to a car that was parked next a to pump and started to pour the gallon into the tank.

I suppose I had done my good deed and could have just walked away knowing that I had helped a little but something in me wanted to do more. I walked over to his car lifted the pump handled and tapped my card on the gas pump and put $20 in his tank. I drive around all day and know a single gallon isn’t going to take you very far. This guy, never asked him his name, was genuinely grateful for my small measure of kindness he said, “thank you” then said that he wished he could repay me, but he couldn’t. I told him that I was in a position to help and there was no need to worry about it and hoped his day got better. I walked back to my car believing that our interaction was over when, this guy who I had helped, came over to me and again said thank you and surprisingly asked, “I know it’s not much, but can I give you a hug?”  I accepted the hug, which I did not expect, and this guy told me that I didn’t know how much I had done for him.

A Small act of Kindness helped him and a hug from a stranger reminded me that ‘Kindness no matter of small is never wasted.’

Sappy I know, not my usual rant but I wanted to put this out in the universe as a reminder to everyone that kindness doesn’t cost you a thing but can mean everything to someone else.