I’m helping those who helped me. Those that looked after me when I couldn’t look after myself, I’m now helping with the rebuilding of their house.
On my last day in Jerusalem, I gave all the money I had with me to a beggar. I don’t know why it sticks with me, but that moment made me feel good somehow.
I spent 3 days in a Mexican attic (in the summer) helping install an air conditioning system so that the Doctors without Borders would be comfortable and willing to go back.
I’m a computer geek BTW and know nothing about birthin no air conditioners.
I got one!
Background: I was on the academic team in high school (class of '05). And I was pretty good at the math component (It was a written, multiple choice test). For four years, I had a rivalry with this other guy, Jason. There’s a big tournament, with district, regional, and state levels every year. And at every level, for three years, Jason had placed higher than me. But senior year, at the state finals, we both came out of the test and knew that we’d gotten the same score, a 45. We also knew that that meant we’d most likely finish 1-2, but we didn’t know which order.
So anyway, at the awards ceremony, they called up the top ten finishers randomly. Sure enough, Jason and I got called up. Then they revealed who got tenth, ninth, etc. When some guy got third, Jason and I knew that we would be 1 and 2. And then they called Jason’s name for second. Now the majority of people in my position yell and scream and jump up and down. But here’s the little thing I’m proud of. I calmly shook Jason’s hand, congratulated him, and wished him luck for next year (he was only a junior). And after the ceremony, I went and told Jason’s parents that they should be proud of him, and that if I could go from tenth as a junior to first as a senior, imagine what Jason could do.
I know that that’s a really little thing, but I’m proud of it. Jason and I worked our asses off to get there, and I’m proud of myself for showing restraint and being a good winner. I think it meant a lot to Jason, since everyone would rather lose to a nice guy than to a total jerk. Anyway, Jason’ll probably win this year (state’s later in March).
But I got the big trophy (1’11 5/8", not that I measured it)
Oh, and the competition I’m talking about is Governor’s Cup, for any Kentuckians out there.
Great stuff!
Your wooden toys remind me of ones that my dad used to make for me when I was wee. My favorite was this little man with a heart shaped body, heart shaped head, and he had stick arms and legs. One of his wooden ball hands had a hole drilled in it in which he was holding a little wooden spear. My dad painted an angry face on him. When he gave it to me, I was a little bewildered and asked what it was.
“A heart attack,” he said. :rolleyes: 
For those who wonder where Dopers come from: they are the children of people who would have been Dopers if the technology had existed.
Ah, Dad humor, A man after my own ‘Heart’.
Thanks,
Jim
I may have mentioned it somewhere on the board before, but I’m still very proud of the gift I gave my mom for her 50th birthday. I was a broke college kid, so I couldn’t afford much. I bought her a bag of Hershey’s Kisses, counted out 50 and numbered each one on the bottom. Then I spent a couple weeks working on a numbered list of “50 Reasons Why I Love my Mom.” I sent the list and the Kisses to my mom with instructions not to read the list right away, but pick a Kiss out of the box, look at the number on the bottom, and read its matched reason from the list. She loved it; she said she couldn’t believe I came up with fifty reasons to love her.
What an odd thing. I was just thinking of posting a similar thread. The other day I went out and mailed my taxes and some other Official stuff and was inordinately pleased with myself. The next day I went and got the household items and was again inordinately pleased with myself. (When I was young I was very bad at being organized.)
And so, I am rather proud when I do the menial things like taking out the garbage and picking up groceries.
I work in a museum. I give tours to the public, do research, clean and store artifacts.
We were given an antique car with brass oil-lamp headlights. I spent four months cleaning them. Every time I walk by that car, I get a little tingle of pride-- my work will live forever.
I gave a homeless guy a cane that I personally bought for him. Makes me feel good every time I see him. He waves at me. 
I go to Bikram yoga, which is a 90 minute workout in a heated room. Monday I completed a 30 day challenge…in which I went everyday for 30 days.
Not only that…but one day there was a new person in class who had to leave the room. My teacher, Barry, went out in the lobby to check on her. He had me lead the class while he was out! 
Sometimes I go to the bookstore and I leave without buying even a single book. I have self control!
I’m a really good present buyer. The best was for either mother’s day or my mom’s birthday last year, I bought her a $50 gift certificate to her favorite fabric store over the phone (she’s a quilter and lives 2000 miles away from me) and had them mail it to her. She was thrilled. I’ve repeated the present a couple times since then, and I don’t think it’s gotten old yet. My mom can never have enough fabric.
I’ve studied, and studied hard, but I just can’t seem to reach that level of enlightenment.
That’s sweet, as all these stories are.
I was at a large going away party in a park near a rushing mountain river. From a hill, I noticed 4 kids walking down the river, barely being able to stand against the flow on the cobble stream bed.
I went down stream of them to watch or perhaps rescue, and they kept coming. I saw that the river got much deeper. If they fell there would not be much that I could do. Not for four of them.
The kids where in the middle of the river about 60’ feet wide about 2-3 feet deep running fast, very fast. No way would you stand up if you lost your footing. Where I was was 40-50 foot wide and 3-5 feet deep. Don’t know the water temp. But we where at 10,500 feet in the spring.
I wanted them to see me, and worked closer to the bank. I fell in (river was high, overflowing with spring run off and the grass was slick). I took one step from a grassy gravely area into about 8" of water, and bang, I was in the river (it was that slick, I was wearing shorts and river runner sandles with exclelent lug sole traction on them). I managed to grab some willow branches before I was swept down stream. Holding on to the willows, I managed to get their attention and get them to move to the bank before they got in trouble.
Climbing out, I fell again. Right on my chin. I do know what it means to see stars. Rang my bell I did. Yow.
I’m not a parent, but like to keep my eyes open. If the kids moved another 50’ downstream, they would have had to swim/self rescue.
It looked like a tragedy waiting to happen. Maybe I prevented one.
Cleaning my apt top to bottom in the two hours between me getting home from work and a friend coming over to crash on 24 hrs notice. I’ve apparently learned from my mother’s example better than I thought, despite being a layabout sort of child.
Spending an hour or so every once in a while speaking to high school students of various stripes about My Experiences As A Fill-In-The-Blank (ie, female/disabled/corporate peon/English major). Who knows, maybe a few of them even paid attention to the Grown Up.
Our school, namely the principal, was born from the negative of Henry Clay. If there is a problem, they ban everything even slightly related to it. As with our GSA shirts - one or two people may wear anti-GSA ones, and instead of punishing them for hate speech, no one can wear shirts now, not even the legitimate club. This happened with flyers, too. I put up several GSA flyers, ones that just said the meeting and times, then someone posted some stupid Anti-GSA ones (stupid, as in they picked Sodom, and not Romans), and now no club can put up flyers.
Anyway…
Apparently, we were having problems with PDAs at our school, which should be banned. No body wants to see people spooning or snogging in the hall, and that is a given.
However…
They banned nearly any form of touching. You can now be suspended for, and I paraphrase, “leaning inapropriately, hugging, putting arms around another,…” etc, for about 10 items.
Now, I don’t know about you, but if a friend of mine is having a bad day, or is feeling bad in general, I give them a hug. Hugging is not dry humping - it’s a freaking hug. There is a definite difference, but the subtlety is lost on the administration.
So…
A friend of mine just said, randomly, “man, we should get everyone to hug.” I thought it was brilliant. I promised him I’d see what I’d do. It’s now planned that, as many people we can find, will hug on the front lawn afterschool this Friday. Just a giant, massive hug.
I’ve made flyers, talked up everybody, and I’m pretty sure it will be a success. In fact, I’ll post pictures, if it turns out to be awesome.
I’m proud because, although I do stuff like this all the time, this is by far my favorite. It’s just not random, it’s actually pertinent, and it should be pretty fun.
We’ll see how it goes.
Fortunately, buying books makes you feel good too.
Mmmm…books…
what is GSA?
As there are anti GSAs, I would guess a Gay organization, but just a guess.
In fact based on that thought I googled anti-GSA and got many hits.
GSA would appear to be gay-straight alliances
Jim