It's the little things

The world has gone crazy. This country has gone crazy. There is so much to be disappointed in...to be angry about. I seems overwhelming at times. There is so much greed and selfishness and jealousy and outright hatred, that it's easy to forget that there are a lot of truly decent people in the world. And we have to pay attention to them when we see them...even if it is just to see the decency and recall the memory later when the bad things seem to pile up....so we can remember and bring hope back into our hearts. Here's an example:

A few months ago I was sitting in a restaurant in Eastern Oregon having breakfast with my boyfriend. In a booth across from me was a pretty old man and his wife. The waitress brought their breakfasts and set them down and the old gentleman asked the waitress for a napkin, so she went off to get him one. While she was off getting the napkin he reached into his back pocket to retrieve his billfold. This man had a very severe case of palsy, and he shook terribly. He reached back awkwardly to pull out his wallet from his back pocket, he shakily opened it up and took out a one dollar bill and placed it on the table. Then and he closed his wallet and started to put it back in his pocket...and it took him so long because of the tremors. Then he came back to the dollar bill and set to folding it and then he palmed it....like to used to do in the old days...and he held it there in his shaky hand until she came back with his napkin...and it took her a long time too.....and when she returned with it he said, "Thank you," and took her hand...so that both hands are shaking wildly now, and she feels the bill between their palms and she gives a nervous little laugh and looks at him and says, "Thank you," and you can tell she is surprised and touched too, and she walks off. And there I am watching this old man take so much effort to give this waitress a dollar for her effort....and I am crying. Not just a few tears welling up in my eyes, but the kind of crying that gets caught in your throat. And my boyfriend looks at me and asks, "what's the matter?" And I tell him even though the crying gets worse because I am trying to talk, and he just smiles and says, "I love you Lee Petmecky," and resumes his breakfast. And I was touched by that too..that he didn't think I was crazy or weird to be crying in a restaurant because an old man was being nice.

I swear it was one of the sweetest things I have ever seen. That old man was just being nice because he wanted to. He wasn't doing it to look good, or for any attention whatsoever. He was just showing another person his gratitude. And it was a monumental effort...but he did it....happily.