Stop and Smell the People

Letter to the Editor…

I get a lot of e-mail from you. I read them all. I usually reply to them all as well. Sometimes I don’t. I’ll read one and think, “I really need make this reply thoughtful and I’m tired so I’ll do it tomorrow.” Tomorrow rolls around and I open my e-mail and that one is no longer bold and voila! I don’t look at it. Poof!

I haven’t posted any e-mails in a heck of a log time. Mostly because there is already a “Comment” section on the website which has created a fun back-and-forth between us. (By the way, if you follow the comments -there have been nearly 3000- you’ll notice my mother has recently purchased her first computer and has graced SASTP Nation with a comment this week. I can die happy now. My mom means the universe to me. To have her reading my website and interacting at her age is special to me. She’s 39.)

Anyway, I’m posting an e-mail today. Partly because I’m terribly vain. And partly because this one hit a nerve. You never know what people around you are going through. And you may not even realize who you are touching just by being available.

The world is a little short on kindness these days. If we could bottle and sell meanness, or run our cars on it, all of our troubles would be over.

So here’s a little kindness for us all…

“You are very missed in NC, Mike, but things happen for a reason. You would not have your website if you were still in Charlotte and I don’t know what shape mentally I would be in without it.

Since May 8th (my birthday) I have been taking care of my 94 yr old father. I am on Family Leave (no pay) so my mental health is not the best. But your website has brought smiles to me that I would not have had during this time. My father (a Normandy veteran) has been recovering from double pneumonia and has made a tremendous comeback (that generation has a will no other generation has or will have!). I hope to have him settle at the VA facility in Salisbury by the end of this month.

I just wanted to say thank you…even the smiling pictures of you and your beautiful Anna at the top of this page brightens my day.

God Bless you and your family, Mike, and again thank you very much.

Carol Smith
Salisbury, NC”

Carol, I have to be honest: Lately I’ve been a little adrift. I don’t sleep enough. I don’t get enough time with Anna and Crowley.

I haven’t spent any time simply being. I’m just doing. Doing and more doing. Doing gets empty when you’re not being.

So your e-mail touched me at just the right time. You’re being. And being there for the most important person in your life. It made me stop and think. I do too much and I’m not being much at all. The fact that you felt like I was here for you helped me. It encouraged me. It made me less tired. Less adrift.

I owe you one. Thanks from my whole heart… MR