“What if I BELIEVED kindness to be a coupon” Tracey Smith Ms. Weber English 090 November 11, 2012

When we arrived to Sunday morning paper or to a coupon book standing in a store line we think, "yeah! $1.00 off my next 2 boxes of hamburger helper"! Better yet, we think of how much money we are saving ourselves at that checkout line as if we are playing a game of..., I am going to save more moo-la, also know as money, than I thought this week and I will have more funds in my pocket for this weekends fun! However, what if we looked at kindness as a coupon? I believe that we look at our lives day-to-day, more and more as if we are expecting someone to be nice to us. Not giving it a second clipping about what change we are saving by being kind to one another. Saving $1.00 in our bank of kindness, for that rainy day of, "I hate my life"....; also known as kindness, should be something we all think about . I mean, would it even take as long as scanning our eyes over the Sunday paper, looking online for coupon codes, or looking for those red clearance stickers? I believe we should take our kindness and think of it more as a savings in our coupon bank for a remarkable hoping for a $1.00 saved in the Universe of life. If I would consider it a savings of money, could I not think of it as a deposit on my own debts of unkindness? Does life and kindness not go hand in hand? Should I not recall the old saying "being kindness is goodness"..., if my parents didn't teach me after all someone had to teach me how to save a buck myself. I believe that looking into the eyes of a stranger. Being kind and pushing for nice, or making kind with an old foe isn't that bad. I mean, after all their goes another coupon you can save on Tracey. Keep my friends close and my enemies closure. Sadly, that is the way I was taught as a child throughout my early adult hood without a word spoken only watching and learning from my siblings, peers, relatives, and believe it or not my parents. I guess being that observant in my life goes to prove that I must learn from others mistakes only after I have tried them on for size. It wasn't until I was 39 until I realized that being nice was much more than just a savings on my karma but a way of life. How much easier it was for me to smile and check myself from day-to-day

and pick my battles. I remember that everything as a teenager and young adult was remarkable madness when I was being treated badly however, I never gave it a second thought when I was not putting forth much of an effort of my own to be kind for the smallest little things that would have made someones day. Amazing, how I think now, I am no longer a 40-year-old woman but on my 11th anniversary of my 29th birthday and well it takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile. I look at being kind as if I do think of another persons feelings, or about why they might not be nice to me; as if I am going to be punished by MY Universe and MY God. I look at things now, as if, I don't stay in the black and out of the red with my kindness, their might not be another coupon for me to clip to stock up on that role of dignity. I look at life and kindness more as how others may feel or what they might be going through that day. How my kindness could have made their day easy or if I was hateful and unkind how this could be detrimental to their life savings and how I may have stolen their coupon book. What would a smile have done. Saved me some cash off my debt to man kind. A frown could have taken away from my next wonderful sun shine day. I believe its alright to look at life as whatever we decide to look at it. However, in the end it isn't only I that may have saved from my clipping art of life. I believe that saving someones feelings and putting forth the effort every second, of every day, moment, and breath that its going to be okay. I believe that knowing what I believe in, and have learned as a child to my adult hood, has taught me that being in the black is okay; as long as my lights are always on in my heart. This, I can give myself a large deposit for, because this, I have clipped and saved on my own learned lessons of love, and life. So blessed it be, blessed it be. I will believe what I believe and that is a coupon that doesn't have a expiration on it, for my life.