Handing out free money should be easy.Last week, I helped with 77 Kids Do Good Day. It was awesome, as Mary from It's a Wonderful Life would say: 'I felt like a bootlegger's wife', handing dollar bills out to the left and the right. Kids would follow behind me, I could her them whispering 'that's her, wait until she turns around and ask her', in hopes of getting that
But some kids didn't get it. A young boy handed it back to me and told me that he 'didn't want it'. I told him, 'no, go ahead and take it, we are asking that you try to do something good with that dollar, but there are suggestions on the back to do some things for free too', I winked at him and told him again it was fine. He ended up shaking his head, handing me back the dollar and leaving with his head down.
Two other girls came up to the table, twin sisters. They looked like I did at 10 years of age or so, not quite fitting into the skin of a little girl and not quite filling out in the curves of a teenager. I handed them both a dollar. Their eyes widened. I explained to them that they can do something good with it and they agreed. I invited them to write down an idea of theirs for 'doing good' so we could stick it on our map of Minnesota. Of course, like most 10 year olds, they instantly couldn't make up their minds.
I suggested 'maybe you could make your beds in the morning to help out your mom or your dad?'.
One of the girls peeped 'we don't have beds, we sleep on the couch'.
(I think my heart stopped a little at that moment).
I then suggested 'maybe you could share your toys with eachother?'.
I don't know what I was thinking, perhaps something along the lines of: what child doesn't have a toy or two... but the other sister responded 'we don't have any toys.'
(I wanted to hand over all the dollar bills I had to them at that very second.)
I tried one last time 'maybe cleaning up after breakfast, you know, clearing the table?'.
The sisters chimed in that 'we eat our breakfast from a box so cleaning up would be easy!'.
I think my heart broke a little.
No, handing out free money wasn't all easy.
*I'm cheating on Wordless Wednesdays, I'm such a rule breaker... it's another one of those 'I'm wordless moments' though.
17 comments:
for real? oh honey...
I probably would be suspicious too actually. So weird!!! What a cool experiment!
Wow, you didn't mention that at the museum. So very sad.
It was really weird that people were not interested in free $, I'm all about free $!
This made me sad. I especially hate when kids don't have the opportunity to enjoy being kids. Bless your heart for taking the time to do this.
What a good idea. Take note though putting money in parking meters that are not your is illegal.
I love the new design of your blog.
Aww...that made me tear up. I for sure would've broken down right then and there. ((hugs))
That's hard. For them.
Wow. They need to be on the receiving side of that good.
Wow that would be so sad. You just never know.
Oh my, this was just heartbreaking. Thank you for passing the story along.
Do you realize you just became "that lady" to those girls? As in, years from now, when they're reminiscing about the good parts of life, they'll say, "Remember that lady who gave us dollars and asked us to do something good?"
Way to go, That Lady!
Oh, and for all the things he would do that he shouldn't, my son would have been the one to deny himself the free dollar. Maybe you should get that mom's name and number for me. She might need to be warned, lol.
I forgot to mention that I did take my son to school that day, and the rest of his school days (despite wanting to maybe sometimes just drop him off near one of our vast "fields" known as the Mojave Desert, hehe... ahem).
Oh my goodness..how very sad. I wonder what they did with their dollar.
I love this idea, but your story made me a little sad. It sounds like you handled it very well though.
Stop over at my place. You are the main subject. :)
I am here via Julie at Another Chance Ranch. What a beautiful thing you did and what a blessing you became to those girls. They will never forget you and your kindness.
wow.
heartbreaking.
perhaps you made their days with your dollars.
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