Wednesday, December 16, 2009

People never forget how you make them feel


Maya Angelou, a wise woman with a kind and generous heart once said: "People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

How true that is if you think about it. We spend so much time carefully choosing our words in conversation and in letters, but it is the way that people feel when we communicate with them that they remember. Have we made them feel loved, appreciated and cherished?

In the long run do people remember our accomplishments, the honors we have received, the places that we have been? Or do they remember the time we spent together sitting on the end of the dock with our feet in the water just being together and being friends who love each other? Or the times we simply sat in the kitchen sharing a pot of tea when they just needed someone to talk to.

I'd like to think that I remember this, but I know I forget as the days march on like litle pebbles falling out of my hand. I forget to show those that I love how much I love them by making something special that they like to eat, or making a pot of tea, or even just coming home with a package of gum.

"I'm home and I have a present for you," I say brightly as I come in the back door.

It's just a pack of gum but it says I thought about you and I do love you so much. My Dad used to do that all the time. How I miss that now that he is gone. I miss that, and driving down the highway together singing "Skinny marink a dink a dink, skinny marink a doo....I love you." You never forget times like that. Never.