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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Mark Des Cotes, my favourite donut is a honey cruller and I believe if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living. In today’s episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday I share how a trip to the drive-thru changed my day.
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Can you believe that 1 week from today is Christmas Eve? That also means it’s that last shopping week before Christmas? If that revelation scares you I want you to calm down and not panic. You see, you can finish all your last minute shopping from the comfort of your home by visiting www.goldenspiralmedia.com/amazon. This link will redirect you to Amazon where you can shop ’till your hearts content. With their gift wrapping service and fast shipping all you have to do is find, click, buy, and relax. The great thing about using our link is that you not only get Amazon’s great deals, you also support the content creators here at GSM, and a no extra cost to you. But you better hurry up. The Christmas clock is ticking down.
What I Learned Yesterday:
The holiday spirit is everywhere this time of year. People seem to be a little bit nicer, a little bit friendlier and overall more generous. Perhaps it’s a last ditch effort to get their names on the nice list, but most likely it’s coming from the heart. I experienced some of that on Monday but my day didn’t start off that way.
I had a meeting with a new client early Monday morning. I’m designing a new website for them and I was expecting to meet with my contact from the company to quickly go over some of the details of the new site. Instead, I was ambushed by their board of directors, each who had their own opinion of what the website should look like. My anticipated 30 minute meeting lasted close to 4 hours. Now, I always insist when I take on a corporate client that I deal with only one person at the company to avoid these situations. In this case my contact had mentioned the meeting to one of the board members and they took it upon themselves to join in without warning her. What was I supposed to do? At least they know from the contract I had them sign that I was charging them for my time during the session. At the end of the meeting I was no farther ahead then I was before. So many ideas were tossed around and shot down, that I finally told them to discuss it amongst themselves and my contact person can let me know what they’ve come up with. Needless to say I left the meeting in a fowl mood.
This meeting took place at the far end of town. I would be passing by my father’s place on the way back so I decided to stop in to say hi. My father is 87 years old, and lives by himself in the house my parents bought in 1979. He has early stages of dementia so I check in on him a couple of times a week to see how he’s doing, go over his bills to make sure everything is getting paid and check his fridge for spoiled foods to throw out. He wasn’t home when I got there. Probably out with the guys having a coffee or something. So I took a stroll through the house like I always do to make sure everything is OK. I saw a note on the kitchen table from his housekeeper who comes in to clean every second week. The note said the mouse problem she had told my father about a month ago was getting worse and he needed to do something about it. He hadn’t told me about any mouse problem. I examined the areas she was concerned with and sure enough there was evidence that mice had been at play for quite some time. I called an exterminator to tackle the problem and would tell my Dad when I called him later in the day. I was not happy.
Leaving his house I was grumpy and hungry. I’m trying to loose weight but when I’m in that sort of mood all willpower goes out the window. I tuned into a Tim Horton’s drive-thru for a hot chocolate and a donut. Tim Horton’s is a Canadian chain that’s as popular here as Starbucks are in the U.S. In recent years they’ve started expanding into the States so depending on where you live you may be familiar with them. If not, you’ll be seeing them soon. Anyway, I ordered at the speaker and then proceeded to the window. When I got there the girl handed me my cup and a bag with my donut and wished me a Merry Christmas. I held out my money but she said it had already been taken care of. She told me that that 10 minutes or so earlier someone had given her $200 with instructions to pay for everyone that comes through the drive-thru and wish them a Merry Christmas. She was to do this until there wasn’t enough money left to cover a full order. At that point she was to give the remaining money to the Tim Horton’s Foundation for children.
Now I had heard of people paying for the car behind them. I’ve even done it once or twice myself but this was different. This unknown person had bought gifts for who knows how many people, and he would never know who we were. I tried to imagine how he felt after driving away. The joy he must have felt with his act of giving. It wasn’t to show off or flaunt his wealth, if he is in fact wealthy, because none of us know who he is and never will. And then I realized that I was no longer grumpy. I shrugged off the meeting from earlier that morning and I was satisfied that professionals would handle my dad’s mouse problem. Suddenly, I was in a good mood.
Here’s what I learned
It doesn’t take much to affect someone’s life for the better. To make them feel good. To make them feel special. This little random act of kindness completely changed my mood, and I was grateful for it, more so than for the free drink and donut. The money I held up to the girl didn’t go back into my wallet. Instead I put it in the Foundations’ donation box that’s under the drive-thru window. It was more than my hot chocolate and donut cost but I didn’t care. That money will go towards some child in need and I was happy giving it. I don’t know if I would have put my change in the box if I had paid for my order. I might not have thought of it. But after hearing the girl’s story I couldn’t think of anything else. In fact, I would have felt guilty keeping the money and I hope the rest of the people who received their order for free felt the same. Now I don’t know if my unknown benefactor anticipated us doing this or not. But I like to think that his $200 turned into much much more for the Foundation’s kids.
BTW, I’m not sure why, but that was the best hot chocolate and honey cruller donut I had had in a long time. And, the rest of my Monday turned out great.
I’m Mark Des Cotes and this has been stuff I learned yesterday.
If you have your own story about a random act of kindness I would love to hear it in our Friday Forum. Hint, hint.
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