Sunrise Memories: March 16, 2018

It only takes a small step of kindness to make an impact on a person’s life. I thought about that yesterday for some reason. Maybe it was Elvis.

We visited our loved one at the respite home, and guess what? Elvis came there to sing for the residents, and they loved him. Some even danced, as best they could. One was good at it, a man they call “The Colonel.” Actually, he is a retired sergeant from the United States Air Force. He says he once played saxophone in a band, and he still has the steps.

“Elvis” was a Little Rock firefighter who sings for fun at such gatherings. He was good singer and a good man who does small acts of kindness for others.

But it wasn’t Elvis I was thinking about. How’s that for a “buried lead” Dixie Land and Sonny Rhodes? (They are actual dear journalist friends of mine).

Anyway, I was thinking of Linda Vines. The wife of the late Jim Vines, one of the two bosses at my first professional job in Little Rock. He died some years ago after suffering for over 30 years with a slow but progressive case of MS.

It happened this way. Day before yesterday I attended a conference of the Arkansas Chapter of the American Planning Association. It was the first one I had attended in a few years as I am more than a bit retired from active duty. I saw, and visited with, some dear old friends, and met a few new ones. They all greeted me kindly.

What happened was that it made me think of the first one I attended, those many years ago. I was just out of the Navy and knew only the two guys I worked for and their spouses. The professionals were all old friends, many having attended grad school together in the recent past. The Chapter had rented an excursion boat for an evening trip up the Arkansas River. I felt like a newly released convict at a Sunday School picnic and there was no escape.

No one paid me the least bit of attention. Even had they, I didn’t know enough to talk sensibly about the profession and it didn’t appear to be a crowd that would have been interested in sea stories. It was worse than standing watch alone in some godforsaken place. Here, I was alone but had to watch others having fun.

I was standing alone on the deck, watching my new home city roll by when someone walked up and asked me something or other about where I was from or what I had been doing lately. It was Linda Vines. Before long we were identifying people whom we both knew and she was entertaining me with stories about their graduate school days. The evening passed smoothly and I have rarely, in my entire life, been more thankful to another human being.

Several years ago, a few before Jim died, I sat one day and wrote Linda a letter reminding her of that evening and how thankful I was for her willingness to make a stranger feel less alone. I then told her how the incident helped form a lifetime commitment on my part always to try and make newcomers to a gathering feel welcome, and how small acts of kindness can grow.

Jim called me a week or so later. Without any small talk, he informed me, “You made my wife cry.”

I waited.

“Thank you,” he said. “That was a great act of kindness.”

Yep.