a good deed

this was how my day began.
a beautiful sunrise in the car with my boys.
a pretty good start i'd say.

i drove along, feeling happy and thankful for the sky and that i could now roll down my windows after the repair, and that one of the boys was sleeping so there would be less fighting.  the traffic wasn't too bad, until i let a large petrol tanker pulled slowly out in front of me.

"oh great! what was i thinking?" 
"this is going to be a long slow ride now!"
"well, i guess i did my good deed for the day." i thought.

wait...what?  did i just think that? who came up with that??  as if we should just do one good deed in the day? as if i can check it off my list  at 7 am. and the rest of the day can be about taking care of meh.  and does it even count as a 'good deed' if i was grumbling about it?

i was embarrassed for that thought and attitude.  really, shouldn't the whole day be about trying to do good?  shouldn't we always be trying to live non-selfishly? and to think about others first? to care for one another?

yes. 

but it has to start somewhere.  so i guess it's okay to start with a good deed for the day or a random act of kindness.  and, it's contagious even for myself.  i mean when i start consciously doing good things for other people, i realize how much fun it is, and how much happier i am, and how much more i want to do it.

i decided to drive kindly for the rest of the drive. to let people cross the street, to let cars in, to not be touching the bumper of the guy in front of me so i can block the matatu trying to sneek in.  and because i was much less annoyed, and less concerned about my time agenda, the ride was much nicer, i'm sure for everyone.

so it was good that my day started early- even with a grumbly 'good deed' because it ignited the desire to practice kindness.