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well what do you know, a genuine random act of kindness
bonnie and i lost had ourselves in the full-length creator commentary version of 'welcome to the hellmouth,' so glancing back at my watch and finding it was about 10 minutes too late to get to my clothes in the murphree commons dryer came as a mild surprise. great, i thought. wrinkles. and god only knows who's moved them and where, probably dropped stuff on the way,... i sighed and whined as i trotted along to salvage what i could.
so upon arriving, i note that the stuff in dryers number 28 and 32 is spinning and distinctly not mine. i groan and turn about. but no one's set anything on the nearby machines... a little panic wells up, but just as i'm about to start breathing heavy in rhythm to my heartrate, one of the girls walks past me to her own dryer and indicates to the table on my left. duh, i think to myself and turn.
fully expecting mounds of clothes, some even still damp perhaps but tossed in a heap no matter, i could swear i had to replant my left foot behind me to keep from staggering. my stuff was on the table alright - except where i'd expected to find chaos and unmendable wrinklage, my pants were set out neatly, laid flat one on top of the other with the legs hanging off the edge so. my shirts were beside them, spread out so even the sleeves were straightened. my socks and other miscellany were in a pile against the wall between the two stacks. i walked over, completely taken aback. i checked to make sure, but the brown corduroys and panthers jersey made the piles patently mine. i paused for a moment, thinking and glancing about at the other patrons in the stuffy room - a couple was studying social psych in the chairs beside me, three girls behind me were singing selections from 'beauty and the beast,' two guys were sorting their laundry into washers and commenting on how lucky they were to have walked in at such an opportune moment - not one of them so much as took notice of my survey. slowly, i began to pick up the items and began folding them into my basket, bewildered all the while. no one here has ever even so much as seen me before, whatwith my having just moved in this semester and this being my first foray into a laundromat anywhere, yet some complete stranger took it upon themselves to extend a kindness to someone whom any other probably would've judged as irresponsible or flaky and deserving to find their stuff in a jumbled mess.
i finished pairing the last of my socks and picked up my basket, turning to the girls in the chairs as they were the ones in that immediate dryer area and figuring one of them must've been the culprit. "thanks for, you know, not just taking out my stuff and leaving it in some huge wrinkle-inducing mess" i said to not any one of them in particular. they just looked at me, exchanged glances, and looked back, confusion evident. "we didn't do it," one of them managed. taken even further aback, i just said "oh" and, adjusting the basket at my hip, i turned and walked back to my hall, a little dazed at this emotion i hadn't felt since that day on the turnpike when it was pouring rain and we were backed up onto the freeway and the woman two cars ahead of me paid her toll with a dollar and asked for no change, just to get us all home and out of the miserable weather. i felt warmed, suddenly noticed and cared about not for who i was or what i did, but just because i, too, shared in the human condition and electing to live in this crazy world deserved a little recognition on merit alone.
so upon arriving, i note that the stuff in dryers number 28 and 32 is spinning and distinctly not mine. i groan and turn about. but no one's set anything on the nearby machines... a little panic wells up, but just as i'm about to start breathing heavy in rhythm to my heartrate, one of the girls walks past me to her own dryer and indicates to the table on my left. duh, i think to myself and turn.
fully expecting mounds of clothes, some even still damp perhaps but tossed in a heap no matter, i could swear i had to replant my left foot behind me to keep from staggering. my stuff was on the table alright - except where i'd expected to find chaos and unmendable wrinklage, my pants were set out neatly, laid flat one on top of the other with the legs hanging off the edge so. my shirts were beside them, spread out so even the sleeves were straightened. my socks and other miscellany were in a pile against the wall between the two stacks. i walked over, completely taken aback. i checked to make sure, but the brown corduroys and panthers jersey made the piles patently mine. i paused for a moment, thinking and glancing about at the other patrons in the stuffy room - a couple was studying social psych in the chairs beside me, three girls behind me were singing selections from 'beauty and the beast,' two guys were sorting their laundry into washers and commenting on how lucky they were to have walked in at such an opportune moment - not one of them so much as took notice of my survey. slowly, i began to pick up the items and began folding them into my basket, bewildered all the while. no one here has ever even so much as seen me before, whatwith my having just moved in this semester and this being my first foray into a laundromat anywhere, yet some complete stranger took it upon themselves to extend a kindness to someone whom any other probably would've judged as irresponsible or flaky and deserving to find their stuff in a jumbled mess.
i finished pairing the last of my socks and picked up my basket, turning to the girls in the chairs as they were the ones in that immediate dryer area and figuring one of them must've been the culprit. "thanks for, you know, not just taking out my stuff and leaving it in some huge wrinkle-inducing mess" i said to not any one of them in particular. they just looked at me, exchanged glances, and looked back, confusion evident. "we didn't do it," one of them managed. taken even further aback, i just said "oh" and, adjusting the basket at my hip, i turned and walked back to my hall, a little dazed at this emotion i hadn't felt since that day on the turnpike when it was pouring rain and we were backed up onto the freeway and the woman two cars ahead of me paid her toll with a dollar and asked for no change, just to get us all home and out of the miserable weather. i felt warmed, suddenly noticed and cared about not for who i was or what i did, but just because i, too, shared in the human condition and electing to live in this crazy world deserved a little recognition on merit alone.