This post isn't about the festival, per se. However, it is loosely related in the fact that the motives behind my actions were spawned at the festival. Saturday night, the four of us who went together held an open circle to bring about more abundance and joy in the participants' lives. As part of the rite, we each agreed to do one good deed or act of kindness for someone else every day.
Monday morning, as I drove back to work for my first day back from vacation, I got thinking about that commitment. I was wondering what good deed I could do for the day. As I thought about it, I finally decided to take it before my gods. "Okay, guys, I'm going to need help with this one. Help me to be open to any opportunities I might have to help someone else." Once at work, I set about to figuring out where my projects were and determining my immediate tasks to work on. My mind quickly became lost in the distractions of the work day.
At around five thirty that night, I decided it was time to head home. So I hopped in my car and pulled out of the driveway. Because of the time, I decided to take Route 31 back towards Pittsford rather than deal with rush hour traffic on I-490. That meant turning left onto Woodcliffe and taking it over to Route 250. When I was almost to Route 250, I noticed a car pulled as far off the road in front of me as possible, but still blocking my lane of traffic. I also quickly noticed the woman holding onto a very young girl with an upset stomach. The poor thing was vomitting as the woman held onto her.
I pulled up beside them and rolled the window down to ask if everything was alright. The girl's mother assured me they were fine. However, the other women made a comment (presumably pointing out the little girl really needed a change of clothes), and the first woman explained they weren't from around here. She asked if I knew of a Target or Wal-Mart in the vicinity. I gave her careful directions to the Target that was less than a mile away, and wished them the best.
As I pulled away to continue on my way, I instantly remembered my prayer earlier in the day. The gods had been good to me in honoring my request. Despite the fact that I had forgotten asking them to help me be aware of opportunities to help someone else, they had not. They gave me an opportunity to help someone else, even if it was something as minor as giving much needed directions to a store. After all, it was pretty important to the little girl and her mother.
Of course, what really has me thinking about this is the fact that I don't usually take that route home. Usually, I would've turned right onto Woodcliffe Drive and taken it back down to Route 96. Had I done that on Monday, I never would've run across this family in need. So I find it particularly interesting that something as minor as a change in my routine led to the opportunity I was looking for.
The gods are good.
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