I hate grocery shopping. When I lived in Chico for school I tried to save money by going to Winco for groceries. It was cheap but always crowded on weekends, which were the only days I had time to shop. I can’t stand crowds either. One day the parking lot was extremely full. I thought I found a good parking space and was amazed. When I went to pull into the space I saw that there was a shopping cart in it. I was annoyed but tried to fit my car in anyways. As I was pulling forward a man walked in front of my car and I freaked out. I was waving my hands around angrily and cursing and was just pissed off. Then I realized that the man walked in front of my car to move the shopping cart for me… I felt terrible. Once I parked I thanked him.
The rest of the grocery trip I felt so bad. I couldn’t believe I assumed the worst of someone when they were trying to be kind. I realized that this is something people do every day. Assume the worst. Why do we do this? Maybe we assume the worst because we see negative things happening every day all around us. We see terrible things on the news and terrible things happen to us. Why do the terrible things stand out? Maybe is because terrible things evoke stronger emotions than good things.
This story is something I have always remembered vividly and I retell it often. I see this story as one that restores my faith in humanity. People still perform random acts of kindness. It’s just sad that we find it shocking when the random acts of kindness happen to us.
Contemplations 