Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

> I hope this is neither too long nor inappropriate to forward to Ridecamp. 
> I had a hard time getting through it and it changed my outlook for today.
>
> Subject: Two Choices
>
> What would you do? You make the choice! Don't look for
> a punch line; There isn't one! Read it anyway. My
> question to all of you is: Would you have made the
> same choice?
>
> At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves
> learning disabled children

I don't know if this is a fictional account or not.  I rather
suspect that it is.  It is unfortunate that we need made
up stories to inspire us to be kind, patriotic, more fond of
parents and helpless animals and so on.

Fictional lessons are contrived to trick us into lofty goals
and often advance the personal agendas of the authors.
They also get us thinking in terms of looking for high
emotional impact situations where we can make an ultra
impression and distract us from the simple every day
opportunities that surround us.

I am eternally thankful to God for the parents I had and
the examples they set even though they gave away our
inheritance and died pretty much penniless.

They practiced chipping.  They were always looking for that
little spot where they could make a small difference and
those spots were everywhere.

Stop looking for "Shay."  Look more for the senior citizen
struggling to get a coat on, the handicapped person fighting
a car door, the neighbor who is alone or the Mary Kathryns
who need (and find) those willing to help her complete a
100 mile goal that is slipping away because of events beyond
her control.

As much as possible, do these things alone and in secret for
that is where they have their most value.

I take my mother to lunch quite often even though she has
passed on.  If I see what looks like a grown child taking a
senior mother to lunch or dinner I arrange to get the ticket
and pay it.  Sometimes I get caught even though I tell the
staff to simply say it's taken care of by someone who can't
take his mother to lunch.

A few weeks back a stranger came to my table, introduced
himself and addressed me by name and expressed his gratitude
for my "kindness" of several years earlier.  A brief encounter
and he remembers it for years.

Sometimes my ticket disappears or someone will grab mine
as they go by.  If I can I stop them and tell them it is not
reciprocal only transferable.

There is a buzz phrase, "Practice Random Acts Of Kindness."
It doesn't go far enough; stop making them random.  Stop
looking for "Shay Days," start looking for the Every Days.

That will make every day a Shay Day.

Marv "'How far that little candle throws its beams.'" Walker
Horse Info & Training Videos: http://MarvWalker.com



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