Have you done a good deed lately?

In My Humble Opinion
41

The strange thing is, this could probably get me arrested. There was some kid who was about 7 who came up asking for money to take the bus. It was like maybe 1215am, I was on my way home from work. I wasn’t about to let this kid go across town on his own so I got on the bus with him and took him to his house. I figured I should meet the mother so there was no mystery as to who I was, luckily she was nice enough, said thank you and I was on my way.

I also bought lunch for some homeless guy. I never give them money though, just lunch.

42

Ummmmmmmmmm I am not sure if this fits the thread or not but I gave my first born child to a woman who couldn’t have children. She and her husband never let me forget what a thing I did for them. It wasn’t easy and I doubt I will ever do anything that hard again buuuuuuut it was worth it. They are happy, I am happy, the child is happy… what more do you need in life ?

43

I just got back from a weekend trip to New Orleans. On Saturday night, my friends and I were sitting in a bar on Bourbon Street listening to a live band and watching some wild (and weird) activities on the dance floor. As I scanned the bar, I noticed a couple on the other side of the room. The guy was struggling to get his camera to balance on an ATM so that he could get a picture with his wife in N’awlins. He wasn’t having much luck getting the camera to sit right and get the picture in the frame. I set down my drink, walked over to them, and offered to take the picture. The music was typically loud in the bar, so no words were exchanged, just smiles. They sat down, smiled, and I snapped a photo. Not much, really, but it seemed to make them happy. I hope the picture turns out…

44

Wow… I think I’m evil. :frowning:

45

I can’t remember any big things in particular, but I try to remember to do the little kindnesses: holding open doors, helping carry heavy luggage and baby strollers up and down stairs (usually in the Underground), asking confused-looking tourists if they need help.

OTOH, I’ve stopped giving change to beggars – so many of them either rush off to buy drugs or are con artists that the few genuinely needy are hard to identify. And I really hate being importuned on the street or train. So I suppose it evens out.

46

This thread proves what I have always suspected. Namely, that SD’ers are some of the nicest people on the planet.

Aside from the usual hijinks of pulling a shopping cart from the rack and immediately handing it to the next lady who is walking up or letting people cut in front of me in line (only if they are paying with cash, there are limits, you know), here are one or two recent ones.

On the flight over to Taiwan where I am currently doing a semiconductor CVD reactor process installation, the plane hit a pocket (more like a gunny sack) of some really rough turbulence. As the plane started to shake pretty badly, a little Japanese boy across the aisle from me began to sob quietly and clutch his mother’s arm in terror.

Now, old Zenster can stand a lot of things, but an unhappy child just isn’t one of them. I went aft and found a stewardess and asked her if she had a pair of captain’s wings for the little guy in seat E23. A few minutes later she showed up with not one but two pairs of the wings for the kid to wear on his shirt. She even went me one better and (since the plane was in the “sleep” phase of the transpacific hop) brought along some oddball toys and a little reading light to pierce the gloom for the tyke.

Suddenly, I got a flash of inspiration and asked one of the stewards for some writing paper. From memory I folded up an origami model of a shrimp and handed it across the aisle to the little guy while his grateful mother looked on. We traded the TUG (Thumbs Up Gesture) and the l had the pleasure of seeing him finally curled up fast asleep against his mother, the paper shrimp still clutched firmly in his little fist.

My reward? The stewardess handed me the entire remaining bag of the captain’s wings. So, now I have enough to give to all of the kids in my neighborhood when I return stateside.

Another much more troubling event occurred two weeks ago. A newlywed online friend of mine recently moved with her two daughters to California (my state) to live with her new husband. One evening, she came home to find him passed out cold in his own urine, feces and vomit. He had left the office, quit his job and withdrawn all of the money in their bank account. She managed to get him to the hospital where the presiding doctor marveled at how and why this guy was still alive with a 3.2 blood alcohol level.

After sleeping it off, he immediately went out the very next day and proceeded to repeat the entire episode, complete with a meltdown in front of the apartment building thrown in for grins. Having had enough, she called the cops, turned over his gun to them and he was promptly arrested for DUI.

Her husband’s brother-in-law and his other family members then arrived the next day to help her pack the U-Haul for the trip back to her Grandpa’s in Utah. Another of her husband’s relatives came into town specifically to do the drive out there. All she could do was watch and wonder how a person could hurt so much inside and still be alive.

Upon getting an email from her detailing this madness Super Zenster stepped out of the mental phone booth and sprang into action. I took a cab into downtown Taoyuan and hit a combination bookstore and stationery supply joint. I loaded up with all sorts of wacky doodads and trinkets for her two little girls.

I can tell you one thing. When these two little girls start school in a week or two, they will be the only ones in the entire school with outtasight Pokemon and Digimon see-through briefcases, Hello Kitty pencil boxes, special origami paper and a raft of other bizarre Asian classroom supplies (Supplies!). I even threw in some little 3-D paper jet fighter models so they can lure in some helpless boys in their classes and not have to feel like complete strangers in their new location.

To top things off, I hid a $100.[sup]00[/sup] traveler’s check in and amidst all of the stuff with a note to my friend telling her to take the kids out to a movie, hit the beauty parlor and then go buy something special for her beloved Grandfather. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when those two little girls tear into the box that’ll be arriving in a few days.

47

This is a tiny, tiny good deed.

Ahem.

Today, one of my coworkers forgot his lunch. I gave him half of my lunch.

48

Possibly the best deed I ever performed was by accident, or at least not by my design. I have been a semi=professional musician all my adult life, and singing since infancy. Years ago while in an acoustic duo act, a friend of my partner Jim and myself asked if we could perform at her place of employment, what NY state calls a developmental center. It’s basically a place for the disabled, either mentally or physically, usually the severely challenged. We said sure, we often did fund raisers and benefits and although this wouldn’t be free (I think we got $10) we thought it would be the same idea. We were naieve.

We got there and set up our stuff, and waited in a gymnasium/auditorium while the attendants brought in the clientele, and it started to sink in to us for whom we were to play. Stephen King wrote that the reason the terrible B&W horror movies of the '50’s scared teens was that they had never seen anything really bad before, no mundane monsters. We saw them. Children so twisted by spina bifida or scoliosis that they looked like squashed clay figures, adults with scarcely the intelligence of two year olds, severely autistic human beings lost in some hellish chaos we can only imagine, because they cannot communicate it; the retarded, the misshapen, the self-scourging, the damaged. Never in my callow, silly life had I seen things like this before. The only thing that allowed us to continue and perform was that we were up on a raised stage, and were distanced from the audience. I know I would have freaked had I seen these poor souls up close - I just wasn’t prepared.

So we played pop songs and children’s songs and those who could sang with us and we gradually got around to the idea that they were just an audience and we were there to entertain them. We did our mediocre best, and after a couple of hours, we were done. There was something of a buzz off to one side among the attendants assisting the audience members back out of the gym, but we didn’t catch on until a few minutes after we were all packed up.

Our friend that arranged the gig came and told us that one of the boys in the audience was one of the worst cases of autism they’d ever had. The only reaction he had to the outside world was to occasionally hurt himself, otherwise, nothing. During one or two of the songs we performed, he actually looked up at the stage and started to clap in time. I wish I had had the presence of mind to ask which ones, but I was too stunned. Both the workers and myself were so stunned at the incident that we didn’t know what to think. They thanked us over and over but we couldn’t accept any kudos, we didn’t even know what had happened until later.
However I try, or whatever I may be, I don’t know if I will ever be able to do anything nicer than that for someone. I should probably keep trying, though.

49

Possibly the best deed I ever performed was by accident, or at least not by my design. I have been a semi=professional musician all my adult life, and singing since infancy. Years ago while in an acoustic duo act, a friend of my partner Jim and myself asked if we could perform at her place of employment, what NY state calls a developmental center. It’s basically a place for the disabled, either mentally or physically, usually the severely challenged. We said sure, we often did fund raisers and benefits and although this wouldn’t be free (I think we got $10) we thought it would be the same idea. We were naieve.

We got there and set up our stuff, and waited in a gymnasium/auditorium while the attendants brought in the clientele, and it started to sink in to us for whom we were to play. Stephen King wrote that the reason the terrible B&W horror movies of the '50’s scared teens was that they had never seen anything really bad before, no mundane monsters. We saw them. Children so twisted by spina bifida or scoliosis that they looked like squashed clay figures, adults with scarcely the intelligence of two year olds, severely autistic human beings lost in some hellish chaos we can only imagine, because they cannot communicate it; the retarded, the misshapen, the self-scourging, the damaged. Never in my callow, silly life had I seen things like this before. The only thing that allowed us to continue and perform was that we were up on a raised stage, and were distanced from the audience. I know I would have freaked had I seen these poor souls up close - I just wasn’t prepared.

So we played pop songs and children’s songs and those who could sang with us and we gradually got around to the idea that they were just an audience and we were there to entertain them. We did our mediocre best, and after a couple of hours, we were done. There was something of a buzz off to one side among the attendants assisting the audience members back out of the gym, but we didn’t catch on until a few minutes after we were all packed up.

Our friend that arranged the gig came and told us that one of the boys in the audience was one of the worst cases of autism they’d ever had. The only reaction he had to the outside world was to occasionally hurt himself, otherwise, nothing. During one or two of the songs we performed, he actually looked up at the stage and started to clap in time. I wish I had had the presence of mind to ask which ones, but I was too stunned. Both the workers and myself were so stunned at the incident that we didn’t know what to think. They thanked us over and over but we couldn’t accept any kudos, we didn’t even know what had happened until later.
However I try, or whatever I may be, I don’t know if I will ever be able to do anything nicer than that for someone. I should probably keep trying, though.

As far as voluntary efforts, the same fellow and I were driviing back from a gig late one night, and in the middle of our conversation I looked out the window of his pickup and said, oh, there’s someone lying on the side of the road. We did a classic take at each other and then he stood on the brakes and I leapt out of the truck, my Boy Scout first aid training fast fading out of my mind and being replaced with adrenalin. It was a woman who had apparently been drinking at the bar just down the street, and was so tanked that she passed out between the sidewalk and curb. She was in front of her house, so we stood her up, asked her if she was OK, figured out her keys and got her through her front door. We waited until she sat on her couch and then left. Haven’t had to do much of that sort of thing since.

50

Last week, I stopped at the grocery store late - eleven p.m. or so. I needed to get some stopgap items to hold us until the big shopping spree on the weekend.

As I came around a corner with my basket, there was a man leaning against a post in the next aisle with a look of extreme misery on his face. I asked him if he was all right. He said no and I asked what I could do to help. He said he needed to sit down. I went to a register and asked the clerk to page the manager. We got him a chair and a bottle of water and called his sister to come help him. I talked with him while we were waiting.

Poor guy. Turns out he had had hip surgery the week before and while he was in the hospital bed, 24 hours after the surgery, his wife had him served with divorce papers and locked him out of the house. He had needed something at the store, tried to get it and started having severe pain in the operation site. He had been leaning against the pole for more than 15 minutes and had asked several people for help AND THE SONSABITCHES IGNORED HIM! The pole where he was leaning was out of sight of the manned registers and apparently, the store was shorthanded that night and no employees had come down that aisle.

Anyway, his sister came and collected him and when he left, he tried to pay for my groceries. I wouldn’t let him, but what really made my day was when he told me that what I had really done to help him was just listen while he unloaded on me. He said getting all that off his chest helped more than anything else.

51

Here is an odd “good Samaritan” story.

I got on the local bus. I had a dollar bill. The fare is fifty cents. I told the bus driver, “Let the next guy without change ride free, OK?” He agreed. Then he said, I will tell the next fare to just give you his fifty cents.

Comes another stop, two men, speaking in a language I don’t recognize, get on the bus. The driver tells the first, “Wait, give your fare to him.” Pointing to me. The man doesn’t quite catch on in time, and deposits his fare. The driver is a tiny bit flustered, but then tells the other one, “OK, you, give your fifty cents to that man.” He points at me.

The man looks puzzled, but he holds out his hand, offering the fifty cents to me. I had not really cared about it, but, given the language barrier, I just accepted it, and said, “Thank you.” They both move on by, and sit down several seats back in the otherwise empty bus.

A few minutes pass. (At this point I should mention that I am bearded, gray-haired, and pretty much oblivious to matters of sartorial elegance. I look like a bum.) “Excuse me?” asks a tentative voice. I look back. The first man has come forward, and is holding out a dollar bill, offering it to me. Wild speculation flies through my mind for a second. I realize the first man thinks he was being encouraged to be generous to the poor unfortunate bum on the bus. In the past few minutes he has been wrestling with guilt over his lack of charity.

What a wonderful person this is! I thank him effusively, but I don’t take the money. The language barrier is considerable, but eventually by showing him my credit card, and the twenty in my pocket, I convince him that I am not in need. I spend a lot longer making sure that he understands that I admire his generous impulse, even though it is not needed.

Tris

“He deserves Paradise who makes his companions laugh.” ~ Koran ~

52

Possibly the best deed I ever performed was by accident, or at least not by my design. I have been a semi=professional musician all my adult life, and singing since infancy. Years ago while in an acoustic duo act, a friend of my partner Jim and myself asked if we could perform at her place of employment, what NY state calls a developmental center. It’s basically a place for the disabled, either mentally or physically, usually the severely challenged. We said sure, we often did fund raisers and benefits and although this wouldn’t be free (I think we got $10) we thought it would be the same idea. We were naieve.

We got there and set up our stuff, and waited in a gymnasium/auditorium while the attendants brought in the clientele, and it started to sink in to us for whom we were to play. Stephen King wrote that the reason the terrible B&W horror movies of the '50’s scared teens was that they had never seen anything really bad before, no mundane monsters. We saw them. Children so twisted by spina bifida or scoliosis that they looked like squashed clay figures, adults with scarcely the intelligence of two year olds, severely autistic human beings lost in some hellish chaos we can only imagine, because they cannot communicate it; the retarded, the misshapen, the self-scourging, the damaged. Never in my callow, silly life had I seen things like this before. The only thing that allowed us to continue and perform was that we were up on a raised stage, and were distanced from the audience. I know I would have freaked had I seen these poor souls up close - I just wasn’t prepared.

So we played pop songs and children’s songs and those who could sang with us and we gradually got around to the idea that they were just an audience and we were there to entertain them. We did our mediocre best, and after a couple of hours, we were done. There was something of a buzz off to one side among the attendants assisting the audience members back out of the gym, but we didn’t catch on until a few minutes after we were all packed up.

Our friend that arranged the gig came and told us that one of the boys in the audience was one of the worst cases of autism they’d ever had. The only reaction he had to the outside world was to occasionally hurt himself, otherwise, nothing. During one or two of the songs we performed, he actually looked up at the stage and started to clap in time. I wish I had had the presence of mind to ask which ones, but I was too stunned. Both the workers and myself were so stunned at the incident that we didn’t know what to think. They thanked us over and over but we couldn’t accept any kudos, we didn’t even know what had happened until later.
However I try, or whatever I may be, I don’t know if I will ever be able to do anything nicer than that for someone. I should probably keep trying, though.

As far as voluntary efforts, the same fellow and I were driviing back from a gig late one night, and in the middle of our conversation I looked out the window of his pickup and said, oh, there’s someone lying on the side of the road. We did a classic take at each other and then he stood on the brakes and I leapt out of the truck, my Boy Scout first aid training fast fading out of my mind and being replaced with adrenalin. It was a woman who had apparently been drinking at the bar just down the street, and was so tanked that she passed out between the sidewalk and curb. She was in front of her house, so we stood her up, asked her if she was OK, figured out her keys and got her through her front door. We waited until she sat on her couch and then left. Haven’t had to do much of that sort of thing since.

53

Last night I baked chocolate chip cookies and a spinich-bacon quiche for my co-worker whos wife just had a baby. I packaged it up with a bagged salad and gave it to him today to bring home and have for dinner.

He was delighted!

Zette

54

A semi-nice thing:

The other weekend, I helped my housemates (who were asked to move by our landlady, as they had been there for several years) move home, carrying various heavy belongings downstairs at one place and up two flights at the new place. This included a refrigerator, sofa bed, television, and two string bass flight cases.

Now, I’m not being overly uncharitable in characterizing my former housemates as a bunch of self-centered dipshits who rarely think of anyone but themselves (and only live together because they can’t afford to live alone). And, to be honest, one could consider it to be in my enlightened self-interest to get them out of the house as quickly as possible. But frankly, I never really considered the possibility of not helping them: they needed help, I was free, and so I helped. Their awed reaction that I would actually help someone out with no ulterior motive was…unsettling, to say the least.

55

Oh, I forgot little favors.

I recently found out that none of my coworkers had ever had a peach pie. (Everyone is from somewhere in Africa, where, evidently they don’t make peach pie.) I was appalled! Well, I was at least somewhat bemused.

They had all had apple pie, and did not really think much of it. After explaining that fresh peach pie cooked that morning at home was not quite the same as “Mrs. Smith’s” peach pie, from Denny’s. I also mentioned that they might reconsider Apple Pie, as well, if that was the extent of their experience with pies in general.

So, what with it being peach season at the time, I baked up a couple of peach pies, and took them to work, making sure that everyone got a piece. It was really fun. I now have had three requests for apple pie. Somehow, apple pie just doesn’t seem to make it all the way to work, though.

Tris

“It was a woman drove me to drink and I didn’t even have the decency to thank her.” ~ W.C. Fields ~

56

Tonight I helped capture a Cooper’s hawk with a broken wing. Someone reported it being on the parking ramp driveway at work. Another coworker and I went out with security to direct traffic away until we could catch it. The DNR sent a wildlife rehabilitationist to take it in for treatment. Feeling pretty good about that one…

-LabRat

57

Wow, great thread. I started off thinking I’d have nothing and now I’ve remembered at least five good deeds, but this is the most recent:

I’m driving home and I see a man chasing a dog down the sidewalk. The little dustmop is keeping just ahead of its master, having the time of its life and oblivious to the mortal peril it’s in. So I slow to a crawl and turn the corner to follow the dog down a side street, keeping it in sight until the owner could catch up. The man eventually corners the runaway, tucks the dog under one arm, and gives me a grateful smile.

59

Did I bump this thread out loud?

It certainly deserves to be…

60

toshirodragon, I can’t believe this thread has gone this far without anyone giving you the validation and propers you deserve. Sweet lord, yes, I’d say your action certainly belongs here, and easily takes top honors among this crowd. I mean, nine months of pregnancy, labor, virtually every biological instinct this creature called man has left screaming at you, and you give up your firstborn to make another person happy? My hat is off to you, good woman. I’d take off another one if I could.

I can’t even imagine posting any of the little things I’ve done for people in the face of that. 'Twould feel like mere hubris.

  • Dave
61

awwwww Gee thanks!
Well there were a lot of factors in that decision, beyond just the thought of making someone happy. But it was worth it…