The Best Thing I've Seen in a Long Time

Last week was a hard week.  With the Boston Marathon bombing and the fertilizer plant explosion in Waco, Texas, there just wasn't much happiness in the world.  On Monday (tax day) we were in town to get groceries and cash paychecks which always makes for a long day.  It wasn't a very nice spring day either.  It was cold and miserable, even for April.  So we decided to go to Dairy Queen.

I was standing in line, it was snowing, and the line was insanely long.  I of course left my coat in the pickup and didn't want to go get it for fear I would lose my place in line.  There was only one girl working on the ice cream side of the Dairy Queen, and I think everyone in line was ordering for at least 10 people.  Standing in front of me was a beautiful little girl. Long blond hair, bright blue eyes.  She was maybe 8 years old.  She kept waving and blowing kisses to her mom who was waiting in their car. 

When it was her turn to order, she asked how much a dipped cone was. The waitress told her the price, and the girl started counting her money (all nickels, dimes, and pennies). She was struggling, so the waitress said "here, let me help." She was very patient, and explained how she was counting it out as she went along. She was very patient with the little girl, and was never cross or uptight with her, which was quite a feat since the girl wasn't grasping the counting money, and there were several people behind me in line.  The little girl didn't have enough money, and before I could dig in my wallet to make up the difference to help the girl, the waitress took what was needed from her own tip cup to cover the cone, and wouldn't let me or anyone else in line pay for it.

I wouldn't have thought much of it if the waitress was an older, grandmotherly type, but she couldn't have been more than 15 or 16 years old, and she never stopped smiling.  It made me smile. So when she wasn't looking, I put a couple of extra dollars in her tip jar.

Dairy Queen isn't open year round here.  They close for the winter, so when they open back up it is a really big deal and there is always an insanely long line (even in a snow storm!).  Most of our town trips can be made a little easier with the promise of Dairy Queen if the boys (Cow Boss included) can just be good for a few more minutes!

I think my sister said it best when she said: "At a time like this, it is easy to condemn our society for the senseless pain it continues to inflict on innocent and unassuming people. It's nice to be reminded that far more people in this world are good and kind!"

I sincerely hope that you have the opportunity to see something as simple and wonderful as this in the next week, and can spread some goodness and kindness.