David McElroy

I’ve had a cold for a couple of days, but it seems to be turning into a sinus infection. As a result, I really haven’t felt like writing. I had planned to have my last article about the election Friday, but it’s either going to show up later in the day Friday or maybe even over the weekend.

I’m going to take some NyQuil and go to bed to sleep for as long as I can. I’ll get back on my current schedule when I’m back among the living.

This is a bit of a follow-up to the piece earlier today about random acts of kindness for strangers. In Hoboken, N.J., many homes still don’t have power, so cellphones are lifelines to the rest of the world for many people. The people who live in one home that has power wanted to help those who don’t have power, so they ran power strips out to the street and put up a sign inviting people to charge their phones. (Click on the photo for a bigger copy.)

This doesn’t cost as much as the tires in the earlier example, but it’s the spirit that matters. For people whose phones have died, this little gesture is worth far more than what it’s costing the homeowner. Many people do try to help others. Sometimes we just need to be more open to see what’s going on.

The world is a lousy place. Right? The government is out of control. People are stupid and mean. Nobody’s willing to help and everybody’s rude. It’s a dog-eat-dog world.

Except that isn’t really true.

It’s news when someone robs a bank or rips someone off. The TV cameras are there when a politician has been caught in another sex scandal or lying about something else in his life. But the cameras aren’t interested in the millions of good deeds that are done every single day — some big and some small — by ordinary people.

I was reminded of that again Wednesday when I found this note that someone had posted on Reddit. I don’t know where it happened, but someone came outside to find this note on his truck:

You do not know me but I saw that you needed some tires for your truck and I wanted to do something nice for a stranger because one day a stranger did the same for me. The receipt is in the envelope and all you have to do is go by Warehouse Tire on 3rd Street and ask for Steven Hodges and they will put them on for free. All I ask is that one day you do something nice for a complete stranger.

This isn’t the sort of thing to make the news. It’s not something that will get people outraged and passing it along to their friends in anger. And that seems to be what sells today.

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