Some days as I amble through my life, I notice people quietly and anonymously doing nice things that deserve appreciation. Things like flipping a mailbox closed to prevent rain from wetting the contents; picking up a home-delivery newspaper from a driveway and flinging it to a front porch; moving a grocery cart in a parking lot to open up a parking space; or picking up a piece of litter off the post office floor.
Those things merit appreciation not because they are significant or impressive in their scope; they are not. The people and their inconsequential acts warrant gratitude precisely because the deeds are small and almost meaningless and, perhaps most of all, because they are unexpected and the people performing them do not even know they are noticed. It would be absurd to suggest that people who behave in such a way are good people merely for those simple deeds, but I am inclined to think favorably about them until given a reason to do otherwise.
