When I first wrote a post taking part in the Bloggers Unite Acts of Kindness Day on December 17th, 2oo7, I did not know yet what unexpected stopping points this girl on a road would encounter. I am taking a moment to write again now that my goal fast approaches of completing 9 different actions leading up until Christmas Day.

I feel a little embarrassed in writing because my actions were eminently ordinary as far as charitable giving goes during the holiday season. However, unexpected moments and serendipity accompanied me along this journey offering me far more blessings than any I might have shared.

My journey began with the great and noble inspiration found in ten year old Laura Stockman who decided to share some form of kindness from December 1st through December 25th in memory of her much loved deceased grandfather. With nine days between December 17th and December 25th, I chose to strive for 9 acts of kindness, however simple.

9 Activities
(when things like answering Dear Santa letters at the post office didn’t work out)

1. Create a Candle Group at Gratefulness.org for a hospital bed bound friend.

2. Donate to a family in the town where I live at Gem Plumbing’s “Random Acts of Kindness” holiday initiative. I first learned of this local effort while listening to Lite 105 FM’s continuous Christmas music on the radio during December. I was in tears listening to one story of help given to a family whose father had been badly injured on the job.

3. Buy toys for the U.S. Marines “Toys for Tots” drive.

4. Buy 2 kid’s new winter coats with matching hat and mittens and one of the same for an adult. Almost gave to Burlington Coat Factory’s Warm Coats & Warm Hearts Campaign but am offering directly to a community center seeking winter coats.

5. Put a 20.00 bill into the Salvation Army Kettle instead of a 1.00 bill.

6. Baked cookies and brought as gifts to various places such as my doctor’s offices.

7. Wrote a check to the campaign to keep a public library operating despite budget difficulties in the town where it is located.

8. Gave a grocery store gift card to a friend who lost his job and has not started collecting unemployment yet.

9. Brought back the library books of the woman whose husband had died that day and gave away a 20 percent off total purchase coupon for the Christmas Tree Shops to a woman who had a carriage overflowing with holiday items. Ironically, I would have saved 12.00 myself by the time I left the store if I had kept the coupon instead of giving it away. I knew that these coupons almost never exist and that the newspaper it ran in might not be something the people at that store would have seen since the newspaper was in the adjoining state.

Two moments that struck me deeply during these nine efforts involved death – something I have myself been processing recently with the passing of my dear spiritual teacher Sri Chinmoy on October 11th, 2007.

First Unexpected Moment
When I tried to make arrangements to visit a local friendly 91-year old man that I first met while walking in the neighborhood during my job’s lunch hour, the phone number I hunted down said it had been disconnected. With further detective work, I managed to find the phone number (at least I hoped it was it) of his grown daughter who lived next door. I left a voice message and when she returned my call later that afternoon she said that her father had passed away a couple of weeks ago. Then she said that her husband had just died today and that the funeral home had just recently come to the house to help her make arrangements for her husband’s funeral and burial.

Since I work in a library, she mentioned how one of the things she would have to do included returning his currently borrowed library books. I instantly offered to pick up the books and return them. I ended up coming over to her place after leaving work and tried to offer comfort and company as she awaited the arrival of one of her grown sons who worked up near Boston. She showed me the obituary for her father and gave me a Catholic memorial card for him as well. I never expected that this intended effort would turn out as a gesture of sympathy with such uncanny timing.

Second Unexpected Moment
One of my other intended activities from my post on Acts of Kindness day was to bake gingerbread men/women and bring them as a holiday offering to places such as the doctor’s office where I had an appointment later that week. True confessions! While I have been the lucky recipient of goodies during the holidays at the public library where I work, I had never reciprocated before by baking cookies for others besides co-workers.

Please now picture very red shades of embarrassment when I admit that those cookies were not an easy task. The dough kept sticking to the cookie cutter no matter how much more flour I added and the decorator icing didn’t harden – something I neglected to notice when I purchased it. With waxed paper to the rescue, I was up until the wee hours of the morning trying to get these cookies together to bring to the doctor’s office, the physical therapist’s office and the library in the town where I live.

When I arrived the next morning for my appointment, the ever sweet secretary asked me if I knew that the doctor’s 52-year old sister had just suddenly and unexpectedly passed away the prior week. She showed me the obituary and I recalled how she used to work in the office taking blood pressure when her father was still alive and part of the medical office. I felt so humbled that every drop of sweat on my brow while making these cookies was a drop of insignificance and I was so grateful to suddenly have a gift that could also serve as a consolation offering.

Lasting Impact?
I am really grateful that Bloggers Unite decided to suggest an Acts of Kindness day in which bloggers all over the world could focus on sharing gifts of kindness large and small. Spiritual teacher Sri Chinmoy writes:

One brave step is not too much to take.
Take one brave step toward your
destined goal.
One kind word is not too much to say.
Say one kind word to the lost,
orphaned world.
One soulful smile is not too much to offer.
Offer one soulful smile and transform
the face of the world,
Within and without.
-Sri Chinmoy

I do hope that this focus during the holiday season can blossom into an outlook in which Sri Chinmoy’s following words can also resonate:

May my morning begin
With the breath of kindness
And sweetness.
-Sri Chinmoy