Too Busy for a friend
One day a teacher asked her students to list the names of
the other students in the room on two sheets of paper,
leaving a space between each name.
Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say
about each of their classmates and write it down.
It took the remainder of the class period to finish their
assignment, and as the students left the room,
each one handed in the papers.
That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each
student on a separate sheet of paper,
and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.
On Monday she gave each student his or her list.
Before long, the entire class was smiling.
"Really?" she heard whispered.
"I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!"
and,
"I didn't know others liked me so much."
were most of the comments.
No one ever mentioned those papers in class again.
She never knew if they discussed them after class with
their parents, but it didn't matter.
The exercise had accomplished its purpose.
The students were happy with themselves and one another.
That group of students moved on.
Several years later, one of the students was killed in Vietnam
and his teacher attended the funeral of that special student.
She had never seen a serviceman in a military coffin before.
He looked so handsome, so mature.
The church was packed with his friends.
One by one those who loved him took a last walk by the
coffin.
The teacher was the last one to bless the coffin.
As she stood there, one of the soldiers who acted as
pallbearer came up to her.
"Were you Mark's math teacher?" he asked.
She nodded: "yes."
Then he said: "Mark talked about you a lot."
After the funeral, most of Mark's former classmates went
together to a luncheon.
Mark's mother and father were there,
obviously waiting to speak with his teacher.
"We want to show you something," his father said,
taking a wallet out of his pocket.
"They found this on Mark when he was killed.
We thought you might recognize it."
Opening the billfold,
he carefully removed two worn pieces of
notebook paper that had obviously been taped,
folded and refolded many times.
The teacher knew without looking that the papers were the
ones on which she had listed all the good things
each of Mark's classmates had said about him.
"Thank you so much for doing that,"
Mark's mother said.
"As you can see, Mark treasured it."
All of Mark's former classmates started to gather around.
Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said,
"I still have my list.
It's in the top drawer of my desk at home."
Chuck's wife said,
"Chuck asked me to put his in our wedding album."
"I have mine too," Marilyn said.
"It's in my diary."
Then Vicki, another classmate,
reached into her purse and
showed her frazzled list to the group.
"I carry this with me at all times, " Vicki said and
without batting an eyelash, she continued:
"I think we all saved our lists."
That's when the teacher finally sat down and cried.
She cried for Mark and for all his friends who would never see him again.
The density of people in society is so thick
that we forget that life will end one day.
And we don't know when that one day will be.
So please,
tell the people you love and care for,
that they are special and important.
Tell them, before it is too late...
AND ONE WAY TO ACCOMPLISH THIS IS:
Forward this message on.
If you do not send it, you will have,
once again
passed up the wonderful opportunity to do
something nice and beautiful.
If you've received this,
it is because someone cares for you and
it means there is probably at least someone for whom you care.
If you're "too busy" to take those few minutes right now to forward
this message on, would this be the VERY first time you didn't do
that little thing that would make a difference in your relationships?
MAY YOUR DAY BE BLESSED AND AS SPECIAL AS YOU ARE
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This is my dream - to do the same thing in our class...and the classes beyond.
Only to find a few lil problems.......will we ALL write good things??
~an*
