Kindness, and random memories

Do you ever find yourself randomly remembering little things from years gone by?  I don’t mean the big things like major life events.  I mean the quirky little bits which don’t seem to have any real purpose.  Do you ever wonder if those little things perhaps had a purpose after all?

Case in point: I was a lonely elementary school student.  A too-smart introvert, I didn’t make friends easily and had no idea why.  Skipping a grade in school didn’t ease that situation, though it did make it easier for me to self-isolate within my classroom.  For the most part, the kids around me weren’t unkind, they just didn’t know what to do with me.  I didn’t either.

My grade five teacher was one of those warm and inclusive people who worked to make everyone feel involved.  There were ways in which she wouldn’t succeed – I still finished my work far too early and went off to volunteer in the kindergarten class or help in the library several times a day.  But there was one area where I really did fit in with my classmates.  My teacher had a dog, which she brought to school.  And while the teacher’s name sticks in my mind, I can’t remember the dog’s no matter how hard I try. 

Here’s the really important part:  the dog was imaginary.  Not just at school, but entirely.  As I haven’t seen this teacher in more than 35 years, I don’t know her intent, but her little imaginary dog made the classroom – and our Christmas gatherings at her home – a fun place to be.  We all loved the dog.  It created a unifying factor to which we could all belong, and we did.

In the strange and isolated situation that is our present reality, we have a unifying factor – the coronavirus.  I’m not really sure this is a unity of which I want to be part, though.  Let’s look at it another way:  we’re all part of waiting for a solution, and doing our best not be part of the problem.  Just as my classmates and I all interacted differently with the little imaginary dog, we all deal differently with this situation.

Whatever your way of dealing with this, make sure it’s kind, that it doesn’t harm those around you, and that it does offer a solution that works best for you.  Remember, just like an imaginary dog from 40 years ago, it’s the little things that seem most remembered.