commit random acts of kindness

I hadn’t had time to post about this but I lost my cell phone when I was in Boulder at the beginning of the month. I was so engulfed by the peace I felt at this very spot that I inadvertently placed my cellphone on the grass instead of putting back in my pocket and walked away from it a few minutes later.

Maybe it was the vibes I got from the people in Colorado, but somehow I never lost hope that someone would return it, so I didn’t buy a new one until it would be completely improbable that someone would return it. I must’ve found the world’s last honest person, because a week later I got an email, yes an email, from someone in Denver saying they’d found a cell phone and thought it was mine.

This beautiful person just sent me my phone back last week, so now I need to figure out a way to reward this person wildly, something ridiculous, fun and heart-filling. Of course, I don’t know what yet, which is part of the reason I’m writing this here… what should I do to return such an incredible favor? Ideas?

Anyway, I will now be able to deliver some silly shots I’d taken of random things that reminded me of 43ers while on my travels :)

I was the lucky recipient of a Random Act of Kindness at the Miami metro station. I was late for the train back home & out of cash, no credit cards accepted so I withdrew $20 from the ATM (at a $2 fee—metro token is $1.50, go figure). So I was asking people for change, all the metro employees said they didn’t have any (yea right). So this guy, probably around 18 signals to me and gives me $2. I told him to take the $20 but he refused. I was so thankful and appreciative, sometimes I wish we didn’t have all these norms and could just give a random guy a hug & kiss in the cheek. It was just one of those moments of love for everything good in the universe and it was all personified in this one guy.

So today, random guy at the Government Center Miami metro-rail station, even though I don’t know who you are, I want to thank you, whoever you are. May your life be blessed, happy and surrounded by wonderful people like yourself.

EDIT: I will keep my antennae up for any people to whom I can pay this forward.

But the morning that I was having my banana bread, the pest control guy showed up. I thought “great timing, nothing like a little pesticide in my breakfast”, but was pleasantly surprised with the guy that showed up. I opened the door and he yelled (in a very American Gringo accent) “cucaracha!” (cockroach in Spanish), I laughed and let him in. Picture the Crocodile Hunter as a pest control guy. He says, “call me crazy, but I could smell them since I came in. They’re the German brown roaches, the little tiny buggers”. Turns out he’s the son of the sweet old man who usually comes to fumigate. So I took a zip lock and put two thick slices of banana bread and a couple of napkins for him and his dad. Call me old fashioned, but I like niceties/courtesies like that, I kinda think that’s how it used to be (and still should be). So I hope they enjoyed their banana bread as much as I did :)

as an act of kindness,—i may have been conned, but as I was walking to my car at the supermarket’s parking lot, this guy approached me and asked me if I spoke English (weird question to ask, unless you’re in South Florida). He started speaking really fast and said that his wallet had been stolen, that he’d called the cops, that he just needed to get back to his hotel (he was from Long Island) and needed $14 bucks. I gave him a $20 and asked to pay it forward. Hopefully the guy was being honest.

For the past couple of months I had been thinking a lot about my 6th grade English teacher for no reason. Needless to say, that’s quite unusual. So, I decided to call him up and see how he was. My sister helped me get the number from the same school I went to, and I called him. It felt really good to call him after all these years and say how much of an impact he’d had in my life, and how much of a difference he made. =)