If, according to American band The Shins, 'Caring is Creepy', kindness is just plain weird. And increasingly rare, I'm beginning to find.
I was just waiting for a train when my bag split and spilled its contents all over the platform floor. Dashing to pick up the pieces before my train arrived, not a single soul offered to help.
Imagine my surprise when I got on the train and a soul (single, I'd hoped) offered up her seat so that I could use my Mac, fresh from the floor of platform 2, near an electrical outlet. (Perhaps she'd read of my recent 'power struggle' on this here blog.)
"Yes, that would be...great," I said, dumbfounded and a little flustered.
Also in my hands were a pair of pants and some moisturising cream. I'd picked them off the floor (they were mine, after all) and was quite aware that it was an odd grouping of objects.
She was too, I suspect. Because instead of moving across, so that we could both sit at the table, she slid past, grabbed her belongings on the way (a more conventional grouping - bag, coat, etc.), then appeared to vacate the train all together.
Whether she meant to exit at Birmingham, I'll never know. But I didn't go after her, I didn't even ask. I just let her go.
That, I suppose, was my act of kindness.
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