Doing the right thing is sometimes confusing (photo by oatsy40 via flickr)
This past weekend, my 6-year-old daughter stole something from Target.
I don’t think she meant to. She knows stealing is wrong. But, she fancies herself to be like Tinkerbell, finder of lost things. Wherever we go – the park, the pool, the parking lot – she finds discarded plastic rings, stickers, old barrettes, and she treasures them.
Well, when we got home, I discovered she had two new “lost things” which were just Target merchandise that did not have price tags. So I promptly put her back in the car and drove back to Target, where she gave the items back and apologized like I instructed her to do.
It sucked. It was inconvenient that after a long morning of errands, we had to get back in the car and drive back. It was heartbreaking to see her cry after we had a talk about it’s wrong to take things you haven’t paid for, but it’s confusing because not everything has a price tag or the price tag got lost. It was frustrating because, after we gave the items back, it appeared that one of them actually WAS a found item and not Target merchandise. Doh!
This year I have been challenging myself to “do the right thing” whenever possible. What I have been finding is that, often, doing the right thing sucks. It’s inconvenient. It’s difficult. It’s challenging. Sometimes it’s even risky. Sometimes people get angry with you when you “do the right thing.” Sometimes it is not clear what the right thing is, or if the ‘thing’ you did was ‘right’ even though you felt at the time it was.
Let me give another example.
A few weeks ago, I was driving to work. I noticed a man stumbling on the side of the road, dropping his shopping bags, clearly struggling to stay upright. He didn’t look threatening so I pulled over to help him. He was sweating like crazy, did not appear drunk or high, had no weapon-shaped bulges that were apparent, and could barely respond to questions I asked him. I called 9-1-1, an ambulance showed up, gave him water and followed me as I drove the man home around the corner.
Yes. I picked up a strange man and drove him home in my car.
Oh yeah – the ambulance drivers said that this sort of thing happens all the time, because the people in the housing projects walk home from the store and get dehydrated. The driver said “This will teach you to not stop. Next time, keep driving.”
I told my kids about it that night, and my son (age 4) wondered what was in the man’s grocery bags. I told him bread and eggs, and my son seemed worried because he didn’t have milk or yogurt to eat.
I told my husband and parents about it, who both basically fussed at me, asked me what I was thinking, used words like ‘stupid’ and ‘possible murderer’ and advised me (i.e. told me) to never do that again.
So what did I learn? I learned that the ambulance driver is kind of a jerk, that my kids had the right idea, and that while I appreciate my loved ones’ insights, I would stop again for that poor man in a heartbeat. Yes it was inconvenient. Yes it was somewhat risky, I guess. But I would rather take a risk helping somebody than live in a world where apathy is common, or where it is advised by our first responders.
I also feel like I’m learning more about kindness by challenging myself to be more kind. Kindness is hard. The ‘random acts of kindness’ movement is nice, but those ‘random acts’ that people share on Facebook are usually convenient acts, nice gestures, but people typically don’t go too far out of their comfort zone. Yes we need more random acts of kindness, but perhaps we also need more non-random, in-your-face kindness. As in, say or do the right thing out in the open, in front of everybody, in the spirit of loving another person.
But I digress.
All of this has really been bubbling up lately, with the start of the new school year. The school environment brings new social and academic challenges, where kids often are faced with a situation of joining a bad situation, avoiding a bad situation, or trying to make it right.
And what do I want my kids to do? I don’t want their default position to be apathy or inertia. But safety is the top priority. Stay safe. Then, try to do the right thing.
Try to stand up for the kid being bullied.
Try to say something to the boy saying derogatory things about girls.
It won’t be easy. It probably won’t be popular. But try to do the right thing.
About Mary Beth Cox