Today I felt absolutely terrible. A head cold. A headache. And of course, I had to work both jobs. It seems my body has perfect timing to go "ka-put" on me when I have the most things scheduled to do and take care of. Despite vitamins, zinc and Advil I felt horrible as I drove to my second job and could only hope some miracle would occur that a substitute might be available for my classes.
Since they say feed a cold and starve a fever (or is it the other way around?) I made sure not to skip my dinner which was going to consist of two tacos from my much loved, Taco Bell. Probably not the most nutritious food to nurse my body back to health, but it was about the only thing that sounded "good" to eat and probably the easiest to acquire. As I drove up and placed my order I grumbled in pain as I waited for multiple cars to receive their orders in front of me.
"Come on already!!!" I literally screamed out loud in my car as the car in front of me seemed to forget something and hand their credit card back to the cashier. A minute or so more and I was finally at the drive up window to collect my food. "About time!", I thought to myself. "Sheesh, how hard is it to get some food around here" my mind thought preoccupied with pain. Finally the cashier popped her head out the window and handed me my items and stated, "It's already paid for." with a huge smile on her face. While it took me a moment to comprehend it all, I did manage to say thank you and slowly pulled away. I of course, felt like a complete schmuck for being the typical impatient customer behind the very nice person who was paying for my meal.
In my haze, it didn't occur to me at the time to pay it forward to the car behind me. As I've paid things forward in the past, and never once had something like this happen to me (yes, I understand that's not the point), I always wondered how others felt when they got the surprise that their coffee, food or tolls had already been paid for and now, I think I know! Although my cold and headache clouded the moment, I was a little shocked, but extremely thankful and appreciative of the stranger's random act of kindness. Now, thinking about someone else's kindness at least got my mind off my own issues and thankfully, my meal and multiple Advil later I felt much better.
What random act of kindness have you done? Or have you been the recipient of one? I'm definitely taking this lesson forward in the new year and will be handing out thoughfulness and reminders to others that goodness still exists in others!
No comments:
Post a Comment