Wonderful gifts

When I was in school, we had free meals. We were reminded of the children in Africa who were starving. I ate everything that was offered. This was the lesson that taught me that wonderful gifts are not to be wasted.

If you are given wonderful gifts, it is just a form of good manners to use the gifts responsibly. Throwing away wonderful gifts is sad. That is one of our conventions.

The gift should here be understood loosely: it could be a gift in an usual sense, a work of art, a favour, or something like that.

One of the things that make me sad is that if people want to be with me and I can’t be there for them. That is a wonderful gift in their part, and if I can’t help them by doing my part of the bargain, that makes me sad.

People give other people wonderful gifts, wonderful opportunities… we should seize them.

Niceness toward other people is often wasted completely needlessly. Sometimes it’s accidental, sometimes the situation just isn’t good — it might be just a rainy day or the Internet acting up — and sometimes people are just ignorant and turn down niceness that is coming toward them. No matter how it happens, it’s still regrettable. Things like that are sad and make me melancholic.

It is weird how I find solace and sadness in something as basically hokey as everyday contests. It’s weird how I feel sad about people — even myself — who do not participate in most contests these days. I mean, it is one of the opportunities where there are wonderful prizes right at your hand… and we’re basically turning them down.

“All this could be yours.” Words from a gambling-themed candy bag. I found it sad and wonderful: There was no real prize to win, of course - but the concept of the possibility of having wonderful prizes right at my fingertips was the sad and wonderful part of the thing.