Twenty-six years ago, a writer named Elwyn Brooks White – or E. B. White, as he was widely known – died from Alzheimer's disease.
Before his death, White wrote both adult and children's literature, including the novel Charlotte's Web. He also contributed to magazines and newspapers and wrote short fiction and essays on topics like writing.
His written contributions to society are acclaimed and have certainly had far-reaching positive effects on humans and possibly society as a whole.
Simply put, his act of writing has affected many lives for the better.
Now, consider that perhaps some of those affected by White will go on to affect a positive change in someone else's life through an act of their own.
Some call it paying it forward — others call it being nice.
But most agree that one small act of kindness can have the power to change a life for the better.
Unfortunately, the reverse is also true, where the retraction of those acts or the basic disregard for human life by some can have devastating effects on others.
Take, for example, a disconcerting story out Regina, Saskatchewan, last month.
A distraught and dishevelled man approached a woman at a beach and asked to use her phone to call 911 for him.
With little hesitation, seeing the urgency in the man's demeanour, she made the call.
Upon relaying information of her whereabouts to the 911 dispatcher, she was asked what the emergency was. She, in turn, asked the man.
“My friend went under the water,” he replied, visibly upset. “He's dead. He drowned.”
Tears began to fill his eyes.
The dispatcher then asked the woman how long his friend had been under the water.
A short pause. “30 minutes,” the man replied. He explained to her no one would help him. No one would call 911. They didn't believe him. Some even laughed at him, he told her.
Within two minutes of the 911 call, emergency responders were on the scene.
The next day, the lifeless body of Darlyn Boyd Johns was recovered from the water.
Had anyone looked passed their initial judgments, past their ingrained beliefs and obliged the man's simple request to call 911, his friend could have had a chance.
Instead, a native man, wearing what was described as dishevelled attire, was prejudged and dismissed as a thief or a liar while his friend drowned.
A bystander later asked the woman who called 911 how she knew he was telling the truth.
The woman said it wasn't a matter of believing him. A man's life was at stake.
It was the decent thing to do for a fellow human, she said.
It's these stories that make people question human decency. It's these stories that confirm what so many wish was untrue.
Unfortunately, from this story, it is apparent some humans have an uncanny ability to disregard the wellbeing of others.
And then there are those other stories that completely restore your faith in humanity. Stories about hope and happiness and the small acts that change our world for the better.
Like the story of Hilde Back and Chris Mburu, which was portrayed in the documentary One Small Act.
Back, as a Jewish child, was forced to flee Nazi Germany to escape persecution.
She relocated to Sweden, started a new life and later began donating to an education fund for children in Kenya.
The small monthly donations eventually found their way to a young Kenyan named Chris Mburu.
The money enabled him to attend secondary school, which subsequently enabled him to pursue post-secondary education at Harvard University.
He pursued law at Harvard and eventually became a human rights lawyer for the United Nations.
Mburu faced poverty and hardship throughout his childhood but received a helping hand from a complete stranger and now, as an adult, he fights back against the abuse of those living in poverty.
It is an amazing story of human interconnectedness and the ability of one small act to go such a long way.
Mburu's own words tell it like it is.
“You have to do something. You have to say, ‘I know that I cannot provide support, relief and help to all the suffering that is around me. But I want to do one thing. I want to take one action that will work towards relieving that situation.'”
For me, it's stories like this that restore my faith in my own ability to help make this world a better place, one small act at a time.
