By Taylor Sterling
I was walking to an appointment and saw a blind boy sitting on the steps of the building I was about to enter with a hat by his feet. He was holding a sign which read “I am blind, please help.” There were only a few coins in his hat. I stopped and took money from my wallet and dropped the dollars and some coins into the hat. I then took the sign, turned it around, and wrote some words on the back. I put the sign back so that everyone who walked by would see what I wrote. Soon the hat began to fill up. A lot more people were giving money to the blind boy. That afternoon I was walking back and purposely stopped to see if the words I wrote on the back of the sign made a difference. Being blind, this young boy’s other senses were heightened, and he appeared to recognize my footsteps. He asked me, “Were you the one who changed my sign this morning? What did you write?” I responded with, “I only wrote the truth, I said what you said but in a different way.” I wrote: “Today is a beautiful day but I cannot see it.” Both signs told the people that the boy was blind. But the first sign simply said the boy was blind. The second sign told people how fortunate they were to have their sight where this young boy did not. The second sign gave pause for thought and donations to the young boy.
Moral of the Story: Be thankful and grateful for what you have. Be creative. Be innovative. Think differently and positively. When life gives you a hundred reasons to cry, show life that you have a thousand reasons to smile. Think about your blessings. Face your past without regret and make peace with your past. Handle your present with confidence. Prepare for the future without fear. Keep the faith. The beauty of a smiling face and even more lovely is knowing that you are the cause for that smile. People may never remember what you said to them, people may never remember what you did for them, however people will always remember how you made them feel.
My family had an open-door policy when it came to most dinners however on Thanksgiving it was on steroids! Both my sets of grandparents and my parents always seem to find new people to invite each year. I lost count and yet there was always enough leftovers for the guests to take home. I was raised in a family whose mottoes were “treat your family like friends, and your friends like family,” and “no good deed goes unpunished, however…do good anyway!” HAPPY THANKS GIVING THANKS!
