Kindness

I recently came across this crumpled piece of paper as I shuffled through a box of old memories.  It was a copy of a monologue that I performed for the middle school and my high school during my senior year.  I stood up in front of that 200 some odd people and said,
"You know what I think has gotten devalued in the twenty-first century? Kindness.  It's sort of gotten to be a second-rate virtue.  You know how people who don't think you're pretty will always tell you you have nice hair?  Now they say what a "kind" person you are and then they never call back for a second date.  So I started asking people if anything nice had happened to them this week and everything they mentioned was a form of kindess, you know, somebody picking up something they dropped or walking them to a place they were trying to find or taking the trouble to return a lost item or incorrectly addressed piece of mail, and I though, everybody loves it, they've just forgotten its name.  So I started applauding.  Whenever I would see a kindess done I would start applauding and when people asked why I would tell them, and this guy I applauded had a drive-time radio show and he put me on and the next day I saw someone else applaud and then someone else and then there was a bumpersticker, 'Applaud Kindness,' and about a month later this older man applauded and then everyone else on the street did too and this guy who had stopped his car so this lady could push a stroller across got out of the car and bowed.  It was fantastic.  So anyway I don't know why I brought this up, it's old news by now...but it was really nice of you to listen all the way through. [applaud]"


Everybody loves it, they've just forgotten its name.