Pay It Forward

I LOVED that movie! "Pay It Forward," I mean. Didn't you? I saw it for the first time ages ago and have seen it a couple of times since then. It always moves me to tears - a beautiful, joyous, heartbreaking and inspiring story. (For those of you who haven't seen it, its about a small boy who is challenged to think of a way to make the world a better place. He takes it seriously and comes up with this plan: that someone should do something really big, really sacrificial, for someone else. That person should not return the favour but should find someone else to do a random act of kindness for. In this way starting a kind of human chain - actually it turns out more like a network - of people looking for ways to make the lives of others better for no other reason than kindness. ) PS: You really need to see the movie! But thats just the preamble - there's more: This evening I was having a coffee with SD at the Mug 'n Bean (a kind of poor man's Starbucks). When the bill came, this came with it. Stapled to the card, there were three dark blue bows, each with a little gold safety pin and the gist of the blurb on the back of the card is this: Give a ribbon to someone who unexpectedly makes your day better, brighter or easier in some way. But they must have done it with no thought of reward or any other motive except kindness. We asked the waitress whose idea this was. She told us that the idea came from their head office. I had to ask her because there is nothing on the card to indicate who is behind this drive. That alone is refreshing - it is not a Mug 'n Bean publicity stunt. . . . Later, when I was showing DH the card and ribbons, I suddenly became aware of what the TV announcer was talking about in the background. You'll never guess: She was talking about a "Pay It Forward" initiative that was taking off somewhere in the States and discussing some of the things that had been happening. Like someone getting to the checkout counter and hearing that the person ahead of them had paid $20 towards their purchases before leaving. One woman said she had seen someone in tears over the "random act of kindness" she had experienced - So maybe it all started there. It doesn't really matter where it started The important thing is to try to see that it doesn't stop. Don't you think? We desperately need to see kindness and consideration for others re-emerge from the human rights tomb where they have been buried. Wouldn't it be wonderful if this should become a groundswell of kindness! Something that will gather impetus around the world? We could adopt the idea: we don't necessarily need blue ribbons, we could orchestrate it any way we like: but we could spread the word; spread the vibe; spread the kindness. Couldn't we?? Call me a dreamer But, like the "Poppies and Dreams" post of a few days ago shows, sometimes dreams really can seem to start taking shape. . . .