Have you ever been out with someone who treats a clerk or server as if he/she is of a lesser kind or is "in the way"? It's uncomfortable for you, isn't it? Super uncomfortable. Like telling-your-friend-that-you-didn't-really-care-for-the-ex-only-to-find-out-they're-back-together uncomfortable (trust me). Or riding-in-a-car-with-your-parents-and-pulling-up-to-a-stoplight-next-to-someone-loudly-playing-vulgar-rap-music-with-his-windows-down uncomfortable (again, trust me). Or wearing-a-wool-thong-in-July uncomfortable (I'm only guessing here, honest!)
On the other hand, have you ever been out with someone who couldn't possibly be more amicable and more respectful to a clerk or server, as if that someone always turns an otherwise meaningless transaction into a memorable encounter?
The latter type of "someone" is my parents. My mom is so to a more rational degree -- pleasant and accommodating -- while my dad wants to be your friend right then and there. Either way, pleasantly friendly or over-the-top friendly, is welcomed, and either is fun to watch unfold.
And welcomed is how everyone feels around my parents. Whether a complete stranger or a family friend of decades, you are guaranteed to feel welcomed around my parents. My mom wants to get you something to drink and make sure the room temperature is okay for you while my dad wants to sit in a chair and ask you about your career and passions and unique traits.
Taking it a step further (as my dad does with most things), in his daily conversations that are otherwise unnotable with them, my dad gives people what they presumably don't get in most other areas of their life: kindness and attention. It honestly doesn't matter who the person is -- a colleague at the office, a bagger at the grocery store, a server at a restaurant, a teller at the bank, a doctor in the ER -- I've seen him treat each with equal patience and sincere interest.
When my dad asks you a question, it's because he genuinely wants to hear your response. He wants to know what happened, or why you think that, or how you feel about something, or what it is you would do in that situation of topic. He has a gift of gab, no doubt, but he also has a gift of listening and caring. Most people who can talk well do so with the intent to get a self-serving end result (e.g. buy something; come around to their line of thinking; steer you into a one-way conversation about themselves); my dad just wants to talk so that he can learn about someone and trade stories.
He also talks to people because he knows a lot of those interactions are ones the other people likely don't get a lot of, if at all. To sound like an old curmudgeon for a moment, between all the advancements in smartphones and social media, it often feels as if we're gradually losing our attention for each other and our ability to hold focused, uninterrupted in-person conversations. And there exists an abundance of broken homes and silent families and surface-level-only workplace relationships. It all makes for a life oftentimes devoid of real human touch. My parents, primarily my dad, give that absent, real human touch to people. And they give it time and time again.
It's for this and countless other reasons why I've never caught word of anyone saying a single bad word about either of my parents (or at least I know of). Seriously, never once. (While I'm like my parents in multiple facets, this is certainly not one of them.) They're just two loving people who want to make everyone around them feel similarly loved and taken care of.
That's not to say my parents are pushovers. Being kind doesn't mean you're a wuss who can't stand up for yourself; it means considering others, taking others into account. It means being respectfully ingenuous, honest but not brash. It means putting others before you, making yourself the least important topic of conversation or person present. It means saying an uplifting word, positively impacting someone when it's least expected but much needed and well-deserved.
Kindness is not something my parents do; rather, it's something they live. A kind parent is the kind of parent we should all be so fortunate to have.
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