One afternoon, I saw a kid from my freshman class
walking home from school.
He was quite a duffus. He was laden’d down with what
seemed like all his books. I was wondering “why would
anyone bring home all his books, he must really be a nerd.”
Oh well…. I figured, it was Friday and I had quite a
weekend planned, parties and a football game with my
friends tomorrow afternoon.
As I was walking I saw a bunch of kids running toward the duffus,
they ran past him - knocking all his books down and tripping him
so that he landed sprawled all over the dirt. His glasses went flying
and I saw them land in the grass about ten feet from him.
He looked up and I saw this terrible sadness in his eyes,
and my heart went out to him. So I jogged over to him
as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I
saw a tear in his eye. I said to him, “Those guys are jerks,
they really should get lives, you know?” and I handed him his glasses.
He looked at me and said, “Hey Thanks”, and there was a
real smile on his face. It was one of those smiles that showed
real gratitude. I helped him pick up his books, and asked him
where he lived. He lived near me, and I wondered why I’d never
seen him before. He said he went to a private grammar school.
Well that explained it. I would have never hung with a private
school kid, but the girls on the other hand, well that was different!
Well, we talked all the way home and I carried his books,
he turned out to be a pretty cool kid. I asked him if he wanted
to play football on Saturday with me and my friends,
cause he said he loved football.
Well, turned out we hung all weekend and the more I got to
know this guy the more I liked him. And my friends thought
the same of him. Monday morning came and there was Kyle
with the huge stack of books again, and I stopped him and said,
“Man boy, you are gonna really build some serious muscles
with this pile of books everyday!” He just laughed and handed
me half the books!
Well, the four years passed by and Kyle and I had become best friends,
we were going on to college. He was going to Georgetown, and I was
going to Duke. I knew that we would always be friends, that the miles
would never be a problem. He was going to be a Doctor, and I was
going for a Business Degree on a football scholarship.
The only thing was that Kyle was valedictorian of our class. I would
kid him all the time about being a smart nerd. He had to prepare a
speech for graduation. I was so glad it wasn’t me!
Graduation day I saw Kyle and he looked great - he was one of those
guys that really found himself during high school….. filled out…
and he actually looked good in glasses. He had more dates than me and
all the girls loved him! Boy, sometimes I was jealous.
Well, today was one of them, I could see he was nervous
about his speech. I smacked him on the back and said,
“Hey big guy, you’ll be great!” He looked at me with one of those
looks, the really grateful ones, and smiled,” Thanks my friend,” he
said.
As he started his speech, he cleared his throat, he began with,
“Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it
through those tough high school years, your parents, your teachers,
your siblings, maybe a coach, but mostly good friends. I am here
to tell all of you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you
can give another person. I am going to tell you a story, my story.”
I just looked at this handsome man with disbelief as he told the story
of the first day we met.
He told about how he had cleaned out his locker of all his books and
stuff so he could at least spare his mom from that pain, because he
had it all figured out. His plans had been to kill himself over the
weekend.
He looked at me with those big grateful eyes, and said, “Thankfully,
I was saved. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable.”
I heard the gasp go through the crowd as this handsome popular boy
told us all about his weakest moment. I saw his Mom and Dad,
and with tearful eyes they looked at me and smiled that same
grateful smile I saw my friend smile so many times in the last
4 years, not till that moment understanding how truly grateful it
was.”
Never under estimate the power of kindness, with one small token
you can change a persons life….. even save it!
Kelly Hale Community Member 
|
|
