T.N.G. SIGNS
OF THE TIMES - N.M. November 11,
2004 (#138)
Greetings from
Russell's Remnant: www.oocities.org/dkone_us
The following
article was received by the TNG by email with no notation to its original
source. Regardless we feel that this is
a story that needs repeating.
***
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 or 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 Viet
Nam 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 pocketbook,
took out her
wallet and showed her worn and 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.
***
Be kind to
everyone you meet because everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. - Closing advice from a university graduation
commencement speaker