With news of the explosions at the Boston marathon this week, it’s easy to fall into the mindset that far too many residents of this planet are debauching our society.
We can’t help it; every day as we feed a forkful of mash potato into our mouths, we hear the evening news telling us of the latest case of murder, rape, robbery or assault.
Bad news is becoming as common as oxygen and it seems as though, as our world takes two steps forwards, crime brings us once step back.
Demoralising and disheartening, incidents like the Boston bombings make it hard for us to see the good in many people.
In light of the endless stream of negativity we seem to be hearing, I think it’s about time we heard something a little more positive.
So here’s something that happened to me the other day. I hope it will hopefully restore your faith in humanity, it certainly did with me.
It was a normal Thursday evening when our shopping was delivered from Tesco. The dog barked as I ushered him into the kitchen; the delivery man, my mum and I exchanged pleasantries as we unloaded the crates of shopping bags and, while my mind was wondering over to what I was going to eat first, his was probably on what time he finished work. Like I said, a normal Thursday evening.
Upon finishing the unloading process, the gentleman who delivered our goods held out the piece of paper for my mum to sign.
I’m presuming it was to say she’d received the food, but for all I know she could have just agreed to ship me off to Africa next week.
“Oh, no I can’t”, my mum said as she was about to step forward.
She glanced up warily at a spider above her head and refused to get any closer in the fear it would fall on her and… well I don’t know what she was expecting to happen but she was scared, I know that much.
It was then that the Tesco delivery man stepped forward and reached up to the unsuspecting spider. He took it by a leg and disposed of it promptly in the front garden.
Mum breathed a sigh of relief.
“Thank you!” she said, before fondly pointing out, “That’s good isn’t it? Delivering our shopping and catching the spider!”
The Tesco delivery man smiled. His last words before he took the clipboard from my mum and got back in his van?
“Every little helps.”