My Random Act of Kindness

Emmanuel Muhammad

Prof. Myron Strong

Sociology 101

10/03/2011

My Random Act of Kindness

For my Random Acts of Kindness, I let someone over into my lane as I was going to work today. It sounds simple enough but you have to understand the location & time of day to truly understand why I'm using this as my Random Act. But before I explain, let me rewind to last week when I first found out the assignment was due. Now naturally, I am a nice person. I've always tried to show it in my actions & tone of voice. Anyone that knows me & has seen me grow up will tell you I'm a good person. I'm not bragging about who I am. I'm merely stating this to say that I figured this assignment would be easy at first, but it wasn't. I thought I'd hold open a door for someone walking behind me, but no one would ever be following me inside of a building. I tried helping my Math 81 classmate log into his online account. I had some free time & thought I could help him. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to because he didn't know his own password to his new laptop or his password to his BCCC Email. Plus, I had to hurry up for my next class. The more I thought about doing a Random act for someone, the more I felt as if I was forcing the issue. I guess that's why it's called a random act of kindness. It has to be random. Besides, I didn't have the money to walk up to a complete stranger & buy them food. Fast forward a few days to this past Monday & I finally get to opportunity for a Random Act. I'm driving to my job at Ravenwood Nursing Home, taking Reisterstown Rd. Now, it's a few cars in front of me & to the side of my vehicle. We're on the intersection of Fulton & Reisterstown Rd, across from Joseph H. Brown, Jr. Funeral Home, waiting for the light to turn green. Now, if you've ever driven down this road, you know that after the red light, the street goes from two lanes to one lane. I've always noticed that drivers in the far right lane would try to speed up & get over into the left lane before hitting the parked cars on the side of the street. My first thought when I see people try to do this, especially when trying to cut me, is "No! Not Gonna Happen!" I'll beat them to the spot & force them to wait for another car to let them over. Call me rude or whatever but in my opinion, these drivers know that there isn't much room on this room & will try to take a shortcut by cutting in front of you. But today, I had a change of heart & decided to let the driver of a black F-150 over. As I was letting him over, I figured I'd at least get a wave back thanking me for letting him over but I was wrong. I got just the opposite. Instead, he speeds up & then