“Be the person your dog thinks you are.”

–C. J. Frick, author

 

Since this post centers around credit cards, first a little history. The credit card concept was born in 1950 when a gentleman (who else?) in New York forgot his wallet and had to ask his wife (of course!) for cash to cover dinner. Soon, he and a colleague came up with the Diners Club Card, and bank cards followed later in the decade.

And just to show you how far the credit card business has come, as a college student with a part-time job fifty years ago, I was denied a Shell Oil gasoline credit card. Already gainfully employed full-time, my wife secured a card in her name. Today, our adolescent granddaughter could probably apply for and receive a credit card!

Two vignettes for you today to illustrate that the world is still full of considerate and giving individuals–something we need to remember when the media are slinging stories about deplorable people.

• I was in a North Carolina drivers license office just to get the address changed on my license. The line formed long before the office opened. People grew impatient. Once the doors were unlocked, those in the queue moved forward at a snail’s pace. Finally, I was inside and close enough to the clerk’s counter to hear her conversation with a customer.

The customer tried repeatedly to get the machine to honor her card, all to no avail. When the clerk told her she’d have to come back with a card that works, the lady grew frustrated. Who wouldn’t have? But before she could walk away, a gentleman in line just ahead of me stepped up to the counter and told the clerk to use his card.

There was an exchange between the two customers I couldn’t hear, but I’m sure she was overwhelmed and surprised by his grace and generosity. Maybe they made arrangements to have her pay him back later, I don’t know. But I do know that nothing like an address or phone number was written down by either party.

• This spring at my writers conference, I was in line at the coffee shop. Ahead of me, a woman ordered two coffees and, not knowing payment was by credit card only, handed the barista a $10 bill. Having no credit card with her, she started to walk away until a fella behind her pulled out his card and paid her bill. She offered to give him the $10 bill but he refused it, making his gesture all the more genuine.

What’s my point? We live in a world that bombards us with bad news, and denigrates certain races, cultures, and religions. If you’d just landed on Earth and turned on the news, you’d probably want to hop back on your spaceship and return to your home planet.

What we see and hear are not representative of who we are. Sensation sells. That customer in the drivers license office going “postal” would have made news, but the story of the man who paid her bill will never be told (until now!).

Both stories are random acts of kindness, paying it forward, or however you want to characterize it. Nothing earth- shattering, but illustrative of the fact there are still decent people among us with good intentions and kind hearts.

Mother Teresa once said, “Do small things with great love.” From that, we could say, “Most of us will never do even a few great things, but all of us can do many small things in a great way.”

And if we do, the world will be a better place.