Random Acts of Kindness

I was teaching high school language arts in a suburban district which was traumatized by a series of events related only by the depth of their debilitating effects on the community.  One of the mishaps included the death of a student.  Things were not going well in our country either. On a dark, dank, February morning, my fourth period Honors class, a truly smart cohort of nice people(a teacher’s dream), trudged into my classroom, and I could almost hear the mournful musical piece, The Volga Boatmen, playing in the background

We were studying Shakespeare’s contributions to the Renaissance in England, and a quick formative assessment of their faces and silent glares and limp body language told me that this was not going to be an engaging lesson.  My experience warned me that I had to address the affective domains of my students before I could ever help them wrestle with Shakespeare’s themes.  Willy would have to wait.

“Stop.  Please put your pens down, close your notebooks.”  You guys look as if someone told you that you could not bring your cell phones to church…..”

Scattered smiling and an occasional laugh.

“No, really.  I feel the sadness, too.  Let’s talk.”

Silence.  Then “Mr. M., it’s just that being an adult sucks big time.”

“Yeah.  The world’s a pretty sh…y place; I’m sorry Mr.M for using that term….but it’s true.”

 And the flow of words and hurt poured out.

“My parents keep telling me I have to work hard in school so I can prepare for my future.  What future?!!!  We’ll killing the planet so a few greedy people can become even richer,  Violence and crime are up.  Kids are getting stupidly high on drugs and killing each other.”

“Some idiot somewhere in the world can screw up and the next thing you know, countries are firing their nuclear weapons and blowing up the planet.”

“There’s just too much evil going around, Mr. M.  It’s everywhere, like what happened here last month.  I knew that kid.  When I was small, he was my swimming partner in summer camp.”

And so it went.  I let them vent. And that night I decided to push the Bard to the side for just a few days.  The Great Chain of Being, the socioeconomic stratified structure that glued Shakespeare’s world, would have to wait.  My world was more important at that moment.  I spent hours that night thinking about what I could do.

The next day I presented this assignment to my five classes. 

“All right, Gang.  I am dividing you up into groups of five people.  Each group will be assigned a venue.  The school bus, a supermarket, the bus loading platform in the high school, the school library, and the school cafeteria.  For the next three days, each of you assigned to one of those venues is to note any random act of kindness exhibited by your fellow students.  It may be someone helping a person carrying something, opening a door, helping to change a tire, helping a student find a book, etc.  Just list the event, time, location, and date.  Preferably the person being helped is a relative stranger.  The helper might know of the helpee, but the motive for helping is truly random.  Got it?  The more events observed, the better.”

On the third day, groups convened and shared their observations.  They were quite animated and excited.

“Hey, Mr. M., I saw this girl help a kid from Special Ed look at an Atlas in the library!”

“Yeah.  I saw that a few times!”

“So didI!”

“In Shoprite, I saw an old lady help a teenage girl who works there pick up fruit that had fallen on the floor!”

“This little kid who lives on my block, must be around four or five, helped a little girl get back up on her bicycle after she had fallen!”

“I watched a senior help a freshman Special Ed kid open his combination lock in the locker room!

And so it went.  I let them share.   We discussed random acts of kindness, and how we often overlook them when we consider the moral or ethical state of the world.  I do….overlook them, that is. 

A few weeks ago, as I shared with you on Facebook, a huge hole opened up in my soul and I plummeted into the abyss.  I had been hacked, my website destroyed.  It was just a blog, and nobody, I am certain, ever missed it.  But it was important to me for a number of reasons.  I enjoy writing….more so now with the advancement of Parkinson’s.  Aging and contracting Parkinson’s have combined to make loss a constant in my life.  As we get older, we tend to lose…..lose our sight, our hearing, our taste buds, our driving ability, our friends, our loved ones.  Parkinson’s adds the loss of muscle, the loss of walking, the loss of balance, the loss of passions, the loss of dignity.  I can no longer flyfish the way I used to, a passion that bordered on becoming an epiphany, an understanding and love of nature…you know, kind of a zen thing.  I coped with each loss by saying I can still…..still write….also a passion.  But what really saves me are the people I love.  Fortunately for me I have my soul mate Polley, and my wonderful children and grandchildren and amazing friends and relatives to spark up my days.  But the blog was/is important to me.  Like my fourth period students, I reacted to my deprivation of writing as they did to the events around them.

St Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands

“So on we worked, and waited for the light,

And went without the meat, and cursed the bread”

                                           Richard Cory

And then an amazing thing happened.  Many of you expressed sincere empathy at my misfortune.  It really touched me.  And then another totally amazing thing happened.  Dawn McGee, a former teaching colleague and all-in-all great human being, contacted a former student who is a very very special person.  He then contacted me. (I will respect his desire for anonymity.)   I will refer to this angel of mercy as RV. RV’s superb technical skills are only surpassed by his humanity..  He took days to recover my databases and other elements of my website. He performed what my web host tech team said could not be accomplished.  RV even discovered the exact time I was hacked.

I asked him several times if I could pay him for his efforts and his time.  I knew I could never pay him for his goodness.  He repeatedly refused.  He has a reputation for being what one of my high school teachers called a “Beautiful Souler.” 

As I told my students, you will not find the goodness of the world in the headlines or on the evening news.  What we hear nightly are the bad things.  Serial killings, demolishing storms, bankruptcies, corrupt politicians.  Why the emphasis on evil?  Because bad happenings sell.  Bad news is big business.  Many people thrive on hearing bad news, perhaps, just perhaps, because they survive their own plights by vicariously experiencing some other poor life form’s misfortune.  In any case, don’t expect to hear on national television: “Breaking news:  Tomorrow will be a beautiful day, with mild temperatures and sunshine!”  Or, “A family in Idaho helped a family from Tucson move into their new home.”  OR Senator NiceGuy told the truth at a hearing.” Or “RV resurrected Ralph’s blog website.”

RV attitude and actions recalled the lesson I tried to teach my students.  You won’t find the goodness of the human race in the headlines.  You have to watch the daily life of the people around you to realize that goodness does thrive amongst us.  This does not mean we excuse the problems in our culture.  We still need to cope with climate change, crime, and bloated politicians.  I am simply advocating a reality check.

A deeply felt gratitude to all of you who commiserated with my plight, and a special thanks to Dawn for her kindness.  And to RV;I will never forget your graciousness and your gift of humanity to me. You make this a better planet because of who and what you are.

In the immortal words of Jerry Stiller who plays George Costanza’s father Frank on Seinfeld.

                 “I’M BACK, BABY!!”