Kindness

I just want to write about one thing today. Kindness. People, if you allow them to be, are kind. This is a recording of today's kindnesses. Just today's.

• My dad came by this morning to take my car to the service center. It's been reluctant to start lately, and a few weeks ago when I checked under the hood (for dead animals because there was this putrid stench) I noticed corrosion around the battery terminals. We thought the two might be connected, trouble starting + corrosion. Anyway, the folks at the service center offered to clean the terminals while my dad waited and they didn't charge him. (+2, one for Poppy, one for the Service Center)
• I received a text from my cousin detailing her conversations with the ACT (as in College Board) people, and Stanford Admissions as she went about continuing to help my teen-aged man-child with his college applications. His ACT date remains open until he's ready and Stanford was helpful. (+4, one for the cousin, one for ACT, one for Stanford, one for the counselor who is donating her time).
• My mom came by this morning too. She scooped poop and washed dishes. (+1+2)
• Trisha walked Chance-the-major-pain-in-the-ass-good-thing-he's-cute Dog. (+1)
  
• The school nurse and principal came to visit Sam. The nurse brought Sam a Happy Meal toy (a plastic shark that launched a plastic arrow-thing) and the principal encouraged him to aim for her. (+2)
• Crafty cooking friend, Robyn, brought and assortment of jams she made, bread, and cookbooks. She hung out and asked Sam about his favorite things: food and his animal friends. (+1)
• Mrs. Harlan brought Sam Giada's latest publications (+1)
• A new friend wrote a poem for Sam and gave it to her singer-songwriter friend and asked him to turn it into a song for Sam, and he did. They came over on this Erev Rosh Hashanah to perform the song and brought with them some musician friends and a videographer/photographer to record the sweet memories.(+100, these artists and friends also recorded this in a studio with other musicians/vocalists, and I know there was creating time, and practice time, and recording time, and travel time, and time off from the jobs that pay the bills time, and they stayed and had apples and honey and apple cake with us to celebrate the New Year-and I'm pretty sure they aren't Jewish, and they accomplished all this in one week).
  

I know, you all want news on Sam. There's just not much to report, which is a good thing. Today marks 1 month and 2 days since Nurse Donna said Sam was "on the cusp of a crash." But we made through band camp. We made it to the start of the school year. We made it to September. We made it to Rosh Hashanah. The milestones I am marking and looking forward to have become smaller, but they are still milestones.