From Anonymous
It's not what
we gather in this life that's important . . . it's what we
scatter.
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 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 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.
One Way To Accomplish This Is: Forward this message on. If you
do not send it, you will have passed up a 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 someone for whom you
care.
Don't be 'too busy' to take a few minutes right now to forward
this message -- it could be an opportune moment to shine a positive light into
someone's life.
The more people 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.
