Too Busy for a Friend?

Thu, Nov 4, 2010

This was sent to Trisha by a dear friend and we thought it was something special enough to share on OneHeadsUp. Copy it and send it out if you like. Enjoy!

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.

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?

The more people that you send this to, the better you’ll be at reaching out to

those you care about.

Remember, you reap what you sow. What you put into the lives of others comes back into your own.

May Your Day Be Blessed As Special As You Are !

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