Headline, October03, 2013

!!! ^^^ IN THY WORLD : 

THY GRACE ! -&-

 THY KINDNESS ! *** !!!

I wrote to a dozen baristas, two clerks at Wal-Mart, a state trooper, a spate of department secretaries at work, waiters, waitresses, bartenders:

 A guy who sold me a pair of tires, friends, acquaintances, clerks from whom I bought Christmas presents at the mall, the parking attendant at that mall, and three different newspaper writers.

That was just the legitimate, hardcore thank-yous, the ones for which I had a name and address. I also sent dozens to anonymous people at coffee-shops, dressing-room attendants at Old Navy, customers in long-evaporated lines at Bakeries, operators in the distant offices of toll-free numbers.

I had my rules. I would not use e-mail to thank anyone. An old-school, proper thank-you note is a card selected for that purpose. I chose one that said thank you right on the front. I didn't do any drop-offs either - no notes stuck in mail boxes at the office, no cards slipped under the doors.

I wanted the notepaper, the method of delivery, the construction of the letter, even the selection of the postage stamp, to imply consideration on my part. More to the point, I wanted to consider those aspects of the process.  

I got some answers. A woman from the Best Buy called to thank me for the note in which I thanked her for the help with buying a refrigerator. ''Selling appliances is a pretty thankless job,'' she said. I told her I hoped it would score points with her boss, thinking maybe there would be a kickback for me in the form of a discount. 

''Oh, I quit that job,'' she said. ''I'm in St.Louis now. I am going to be a Minister.'' 

But overall, this just didn't work. Letters came back unopened. My handwriting got worse with each repetition. I began to realize that thank-you notes, like their verbal counterparts, should not be broadcast indiscriminately like grass seed.

I had made the mistake of treating the thank-you note as something easy and casual, vaguely tossed off, rather than something timely and considered. After week one, I started to make some choices, finding real moments from the day before.

Every morning I took three cards and sat them down before me. I was back to my original formula. Now that I wasn't keeping a running list of every event on my Day-Timer, when I didn't force myself into a frenzy to cover every possibility, 

I found that I was in a sort of buyer's market each morning; I had plenty to pick from. I wrote my therapist, and a biologist I spoke to at a New Year's Party about books he was reading, and my departmental assistant.

I thanked my brother for the football he sent my son for Christmas, the one we played catch with until our fingers were dead from cold. I thanked people for parties, for lunches, for jars of jelly dropped on my porch over the holidays.

I've never been good at this whole daily reflection thing, but if I ever gave it a real shot, it was while I was scratching out these notes. Time passed differently. I began to look at the day as a series of ''opportunities for thankfulness rather,  than obligations to a calendar''.

The Post continues:

With respectful dedication to the Students, Professors, and Teachers of Lebanon. See Ya all on the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

''' !!! The World's Honour Code !!! ''

With ever loving and the  -''New Bliss''-   dedication to : Malala, Mariam, Rabo, Dee, Saima, Sameen, Zeba, Areesha, Paras, Sorat, Aqsa, Mamoona, Sarah, Hussain, Ali, Haider, Vishnu/India. Talat,  Rauf, Liaquat, Maham, Mahnoor, Ufaira, Shazaib, Salar, Ahsen, Daniyal, Rahym, Shahrukh, Hamza, Hassan, Haniya and Meriam & All the Billions of You The World Over. 

Good Night & God Bless!

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless