Kindness, Week Thirty One

I know it's a few days late, but here is my Kindness post for this week.

July 30- Thanked someone I hate. That person is the dentist. I spent three and a half hours at the dentist this day. Dentists are my mortal enemies, but after twenty-something years, I finally found a dentist's office that I could tolerate. The assistant lady is especially nice. And on this day, I told her so, as I was leaving. I mean, I don't hate her, but I hate having dental work done (I don't like having my mouth open and having people dig around in there), but I made sure to tell her how much I appreciated her kindness and the good job their team does. The fact that I was able to make it through that experience without a major meltdown was a miracle- even though I did have nail marks on my arms, imprints from my bracelets on my wrists where I pushed them in, and I had to take two xanax and have the laughing gas turned on the whole time.

July 31- Signed a bunch of petitions. This was a lazy day. I like those petition websites that save my info so all I have to do is browse the topics and click a button to add my signature. I think I signed four different petitions about elephants on this day, and threw in one or two for girls' education, too.

August 1- Let someone get a card. Like pretty much all libraries, ours has some rules when it comes to getting library cards. You either have to live, work, or go to school in the county to get one. If you don't have ID to prove this (even if it's a piece of mail or something like that), you can't get a card. We'll let people use the computers with temporary passes, but they can't check out books. On this day it seemed like I had a lot of people who had problems- not enough money for printing, no ID to get their card number, etc. A young woman in her early 20s came in to get a card. She lived out of town. She was going to go to school here, but she didn't have an ID yet. And of course, she needed to check out a book, and not just use the computer. I started explaining to her that I really couldn't get a library card for her today, as she was digging through her wallet to make sure she didn't have anything proving her school enrollment. And I spotted a Lifeway rewards card. I said "is that a Lifeway rewards card?" and she said yes. I asked her if the school she was going to go to was the seminary, and she said yes. I sighed and told her I'd make her a card, active for a month, if she promised to come back with her school ID within that time. And she was very grateful.

August 2- Printed stuff for a grieving patron. Another library act of kindness. An older lady came in sniffling on this day, asking if we had access to living will forms. Instead of pointing her in the right direction, I walked her over to the database computer, brought up the forms for her, used my library card number as ID, and waived the printing cost. I would have felt like a total heel asking her to produce her library card or telling her to pay for these few pages while she was standing there sniffling into her hankie the whole time. When she tried to ask me how much the print job was, I told her not to worry about it, that she didn't have to pay anything. She put her hand on my arm, said "God bless you, honey" and shuffled out the door, sniffling all the way. It was really sad.

August 3- Exercised patience. There is a chain of consignment stores in the area where I live, and they have the worst customer service on the planet. Seriously. You can take some clothes in there to sell, with two or three people ahead of you, and wait two hours for them to get to your stuff. They're slow and rude and generally awful. The last three times I went there, I waited almost two hours, then took my stuff and left. The last time I vowed never to return. But I have some shoes and purses and stuff I want to get rid of, and I need money for my Indonesia trip, so I decided to give it another go. I showed up half an hour early and waited in the parking lot. Ten minutes before they opened, I went to the door. Another girl met me there, and although I was there first, she went in the door before me and threw her stuff on the counter. I was second in line, and it still took half an hour to get an offer for my stuff. Some other people came in after me, and the sales girl took her time explaining the process to them, and got distracted a few times, but I stayed quiet. A loud lady who smelled like smoke came in and was hollering about how she wanted to go home while she waited for them to price her stuff (which is against store policy), and complained about how long it was going to take. Of course, while she ranted (and came back to do so two more times), the girl looking at my things had to stop and talk to her. And I really thought about saying "she would probably get to your stuff sooner if you let her do her job", but still I stayed quiet. You know what happened? The girl who cut in front of me only got offered a dollar for her stuff (they only wanted to buy 1 shirt.) When I got my offer, it was almost $15 for five items. I still have three bags of stuff to get rid of, but that's a pretty good deal,  you know? Almost three bucks a piece! And every little bit helps. : )

August 4- Tried to make it a good day. I made an effort on this day. I cooked for all three meals. I cleaned some. I tried not to complain, and I didn't argue back when faced with a bad attitude from someone else...but it still wasn't a great day. I did try, though.

August 5- Shared some gum. My friend Jess was telling me at work recently that she was out of gum, and she didn't get any for her birthday recently (last year she got tons of gum from her husband, apparently.) When I was shopping on Saturday, I saw some gum I knew she liked (it's cupcake flavored!) and added it to my cart. On this day, when I got to work, I dropped it into her purse. : )