My Good Deed of the Day

[TomInTib]

Just this morning I was lamenting the fact that, due to various factors, I wouldn't be able to really help anyone who is down on their luck this holiday season.

So I resolved to help, if possible, one person a day. I was thinking of stories I had heard about the Great Depression and how people would all sort of all pull together. After all, even if one has no money one can surely do something. I even brought a guitar into the Gallery, just in case I could simply play a song for someone, lift their spirits.

Three sisters from San Diego walked in and started looking around. They were paying a lot of attention to some cool earrings that are designed by a local woman. I told them she had been a practicing psychologist at a (rape) trauma center, and had started designing and making jewelry for her own therapy.

During the course of conversation, one of the women said something to the effect that she should have her head examined by the jeweler, considering the fact that she was laid off just last week.

All three of them bought jewelry. Two of them purchased multiple pieces, but the jobless one bought only a single pair of mid-priced earrings.

I asked her about her being laid off and she told me that she had been teaching women to read. Her students were all parolees from the California prison system, most had either never gone to school or learned to read at all. We talked about how programs such as that are so critical and necessary, especially in California. Out prisons are horribly overcrowded, and there will probably soon be a court-mandated release of tens of thousands of convicts. And they will have few places to turn in order to improve the collective plight.

She handed her credit card to me. Delivered with a sigh.

I dropped the earrings into a pretty little silk patch and handed them to her, along with her un-processed credit card.

"Merry Christmas, wear these in good health and good luck."

We can all do something for someone, no matter how small that "something" may appear.

Anyway, that's my Good Deed for the Day.

Tom

[peace13]

1. Thanks for this.

What a sweet thing to do. Who knows how far your kindness will carry her in the coming months. Peace, Kim

[Brazenly Liberal]

2. So now you've done two good deeds today

You were generous and gracious to that woman AND you helped the rest of us renew our faith in the goodheartedness and decency of our fellow man.

Thank you!

[tabatha]

3. Wow, excellent.

[tcfrogs]

4. Did you pay for the earrings?

Or do you own the store and just decided to give them away? I'm confused.

[TomInTib]

6. Both.

[DainBramaged]

5. Thanks, that felt real good.

:hug:

[Gregorian]

7. That's the kind of thing that makes me feel like it is the good old days right now.

That's what made the good old days good. Caring. Kindness. Sacrificing just a little for someone.

I had a family of "hippie types" show up with their kids on my property. They live in a bus down by the river here. Things are starting to get tough. And what they said was that it's not like it used to be. The land is all developed. And people are just not like they were back in the late 60's.

[Suich]

8. You're a good man, Tom!

:yourock: