Kindness

When was the last time you experienced genuine kindness from someone else? Perhaps it wasn't directed towards you but to someone else. Perhaps you were on the receiving end of it. Maybe you extended it to someone else. 

My office has a small team, so we all know each other pretty well, sort of by happenstance. I generally believe that I am approachable and am well liked by my colleagues, but I must admit; sometimes I've had a thing with doctors. Now what do I mean? I'm very intimidated by them. Over the years, I've had to rely on doctors quite heavily in my line of work. A select few were very kind, gracious and as I said, approachable. They loved their jobs, loved their patients and talked to all the staff, ALL the staff respectfully. Some? Quite the opposite. Crass, abrupt, rude, wishy-washy, constantly never knowing if you're going to get good responses to your questions or if you're going to have to walk on eggshells around them. It's frustrating, tiring and it makes your already difficult job more difficult. Unfortunately, I've gotten used to the latter. Not that they're bad doctors, quite the opposite, but sometimes they just have...very difficult personalities. 

There's one doctor in particular I've worked with at my current job that I have grown quite fond of. To say it simply, he is just a delight to work with. He really loves the work we ALL do, is passionate about our work and let's face it, all his clients love him. Truthfully, it's a breath of fresh air. I know I can go in with whatever question/comment/concern I have about a particular client and am going to feel at ease presenting my aforementioned question/comment/concern. But there was one particular instance in which I knew he wasn't like the other doctors I've worked with. My office is in a not nice part of the city; there are a lot of homeless people around. In fact, there's a homeless shelter about a 2 minute drive/10-15 minute walk from our office. A few feet up the road is another detox facility/CSS facility. I commonly see needles and empty alcohol containers around our doors and in the parking lot, sometimes strewed about on the road driving into work (the containers more than the needles). Anyway, back to my story. 

A few weeks ago, I noticed (we all did) that there was this homeless fellow hanging around our building. Sometimes he'd leave his stuff there, one morning I awoke him from sleep after I walked into the office and locked my car (my car beeps when it locks). Didn't really think anything of it; unfortunately, we're all so accustomed to seeing the homeless roaming around. But this doctor came into the office one day and asked about the homeless man. Again, none of us really thought anything of it. Saw him leave the office and he was gone for a few minutes. Came back inside the office after talking with the man (who happened to be an addict) and offered him an inpatient detox bed. It doesn't seem like much, but in lieu of the circumstances over the past couple of months with covid and everything else going on, it really truthfully stopped me in my tracks. 

Maybe this is a good opportunity for all of us to go the extra mile, even just for a short time. Look for those opportunities to extend kindness. You just never know.