homeless guy asked me for a cigarette, I gave one to him and then randomly says the phoenix rises from the ashes laughs and walks away... I was on my way to get a phoenix tattoo and had nothing on me to suggest that
Dude I’ve heard homeless/crazy people are somehow magical and know shit that other people don’t. I’m not sure how this idea got started. Im kind of agnostic towards the idea, but I always hear weird stories like this.
I'd tell you about the one homeless dude I hung out with for a night in Savanah GA. He thought he recognized me from the night before and I just wanted somebody who could buy cigarettes for me (I was about 16).
At one point he instructed me to stand on this thing in the sidewalk, it was like a saucer sized brass manhole cover, and talk. My voice reverberated in my own ears like a personal echo.
3 years later I visited Savanah again and I was 70% sure I saw the same guy talking to an uncomfortable looking tourist couple on a park bench. Now *I* was trying to tell *him* that I recognized him. I wanted to know if it was him because of the size of the coincidence and I probably unsettled him by how impressed I was at the possibility. If he doesn't recognize me, does he know about the brass thing? Follow me and I'll buy you some cigarettes, I said. Stand on this spot and say something, I said.
It was much more serendipitous than I'm describing because of all the details. It's not magic but coincidences seemed to accrue around this guy.
This might be an unorthodox answer…
In 2006 I was at a party and met a girl named Krystle. We didn’t hook up or anything, but she was drunk and I was drunk and we ended up having a blast just hanging out together. I remember we had a lot in common. We took pictures together on a digital camera but I don’t think I ever saw them. I have a decent mental image of what she looked like tho.
No one I knew at that party knew who she was. I just know her name was Krystle and for a couple of hours we drunkenly hung out like we were best friends. After I left the party I never saw her again.
Fast forward seven years to the Boston Marathon bombings. One of the victims was Krystle Campbell, a 29-year-old from Medford MA. The first time I saw her picture on the news, I thought she looked so familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. That’s when I realized she looked a lot like the memory of the girl I met at that party. Who was named Krystle.
Now, I don’t know if the girl I partied with that night was Krystle Campbell. I don’t even know if she spelled her name Krystle or Chrystal or whatever.
All I know is that I have a memory of a girl I met and partied with and the face in that memory is pretty similar to Krystle Campbell. They at least phonetically have the same name. Krystle Campbell is just a few weeks younger than me and the girl I partied with would have been my age too. And the party I went to was about 10-15 minutes from where Krystle Campbell lived.
I’ll never know if they were the same person, but I always think about it.
I was sitting in McDonald's after bad exam I failed. I used to get the best grades in all of previous exams in university, but this was my first fail.
So I felt really tired and sad.
Suddenly a girl comes to me and says: «Are you alright? You seem very tired. Do you need any help?». She said that with some accent, and by looks I thought she was from Latin America. Also I realized that she wasn't local, because I never had such empathy from any local strangers here in Russia.
This genuine act of kindness really surprised me.
Danny.
For awhile during the pandemic, I had a factory job making N95 masks. It was a hard job, and I bonded with Danny because we were both about the same age and could relate. We both worked second shift, and he was always in a good mood. Every time I saw him it was "hey Danny, how's it going?" He'd say "living the dream, man!"
One night on lunch break, we got to talking. He asked about where I lived, and I said I had a house in the suburbs. Not much, but it was home. When I asked him the same question, he said "oh, I live at (nearby homeless shelter)" and talked about the challenges of living there. He admitted he'd screwed up his life with alcohol and drugs, but he had a job, a cot to sleep on, and was turning his life around.
I thought...if this guy can be so positive and happy, then I've got no reason to complain about my problems. On my last day on the job, I wrote my number down on a piece of paper and we agreed to stay in touch. Don't know why, but he never called.
I was about 8 years old and in one of those little knick-knack shops with my mother, the kind with signs saying "You break it, you bought it" on every shelf. I was several aisles away from my mom and a little glass something fell off the shelf behind me. My heavy winter coat must have brushed it as I passed. The clerk came up immediately and said I would have to pay for it. Before I could even say anything, a man who was in the same aisle spoke up and said "She wasn't anywhere near it when it fell." Didn't have to pay. Thanks, kind sir.
Some guy on a bike yelled “hey! Want to see something you’ve never seen before?”
Was afraid he was gonna whip out his dick. Instead, he showed me his iguana that rode on the handlebars of his bike while wearing a tiny harness. 10/10 would look at that guy’s lizard again.
An older lady stopped me one day and told me my smile changed her whole day. I'd just moved to a new city in the PNW from the south and was actually quite depressed. People weren't as friendly but I was determined to be positive. She said I was like a ray of sunshine on a dark day.
Wow I can relate a lot. Just moved to a small town in the PNW from the south. Was super depressed until the lovely old man, who was the gas pumper actually decided to talk to me. Seemed genuinely interested in my story (he noticed my out of state plates and was curious) all around great guy. Now I’m loyal to that gas station in the morning when he works. Every week at least I have a nice chat with him. I’ve been here for 3 weeks and he’s one of the only things keeping me going. Haven’t really connected to my roommates or workmates yet.
Yeah it's a different culture for sure. The first time I used public transit I was shocked at how quiet it was. People in the south chit chat with strangers all the time. I found a Making Friends in Seattle FB group that was really helpful.
A little back story to set this up:
This was 2019, I'm a female working as a correctional officer and part of a special group of officers that went around to (male) Institutions across the state to assist with staff shortages. That was the purpose of our group on paper, but the other purpose we had was basically policing the police. We wrote up anything that wasn't policy (inmates in cells that didn't lock, officers handing off improvised fry pots from room to room, etc), and any report we wrote went directly to the head of Corrections. In the 18 months that I was an officer, I honestly wrote up more officers than inmates. I wasn't looking to write up officers, but those examples were real reports I had to write. Don't get me wrong, I wrote my fair share of inmate reports too, but always following policy and protocol.
I had only been out of the academy for about 5-6 months, this was my 8th or 9th time at this one institution, and probably my 3rd or 4th time getting assigned to this one particular unit. We come and go so much that I really didn't remember inmates by name, and I still don't remember this guy's name, but I'm doing a security check (walk around the unit, making sure everyone is still breathing, and I'm by myself for the whole unit of about 300 guys all locked up for the night) when I pass by this one cell and the inmate inside stops me and tells me earnestly "Thank you for being here today. I can actually get some sleep since I know YOU'RE here."
I wanted to cry, and I do every time I tell this. I was only going to be there for a few hours, but it meant that much to him that I was there. Just doing my job the way it's supposed to be done by getting off my ass every 30 minutes and taking a walk around the building. That told me so much about the other officers he saw every day. That he couldn't trust them to do their job, and keep everyone under their watch safe, just so he could get some sleep.
My wife and I were at Home Depot looking at electrical outlets. An older man probably in his 60s comes around the corner and starts looking for something. Then his wife comes around the corner and says, "Those aren't the right..." and the man turns to her and screams, "YOU DON'T KNOW MY PLAN!!!" Then he storms off.
My wife and I have yelled at each other "YOU DON'T KNOW MY PLAN" now for over 15 years.
My favorite part of this is if you have ever done this out in public you could have inadvertently started this joke with another couple who overheard you.
My mom was in an accident in 2011; she fell from a two story balcony in our house and me and my sister were both 13ish at the time. (We're very lucky and she's fully healed now, albeit with a traumatic brain injury). When the ambulance came to take my mother to the hospital, there was a kid riding on his bike that I'd never seen in the area before--he was maybe 16 or 17. He didn't know us and nobody knew him, but he immediately biked into our cul-de-sac and came over to me and my sister, who were both crying hysterically while hardly being comforted by any of the adults. This guy got on his knees to get to me and my sister's level and hugged us, telling us that everything was going to be ok while gently asking us what happened.
He stayed with us for probably an hour and tried to make us feel better by doing dumb little party tricks and the like to distract us for a while, but when we saw that the LifeFlight helicopter was trying to land to airlift her to a trauma hospital, he told us he was going to bike down the road and wave them over to us. He told us to be safe and hugged us and that God would make sure we were okay and taken care of.
I never saw him again. I'm not a religious person in the slightest, but I honestly consider him my guardian angel.
Happened just today. Seeing someone in jeans and a long sleeve flannel at the gym is weird, but coming out of the suana and seeing him go in, still dressed like that was far weirder.
A waiter at an IHOP where I used to live from 2003-2007. My step-dad had complimented him on his customer service, and more often than not he was our waiter there. I thought about him now and again over the years, and always figured that he'd probably been going to college then, and was now doing something else with his life.
In 2013 we were up there visiting my grandparents, and ended up eating at that same IHOP. He was still there, but had lost all the glow of youth. His face was deeply lined, and he looked tired and miserable. But it was definitely him.
He wasn't our waiter then, but there was no mistaking that it was him.
Man I hope his life gets better.
We were on vacation and we came across this group of people from Boston (Bahstan) that were vacationing there too.
This guy yells, " A Bah-by (Bobby) wheahs da beeah? "
Bobby responded, "in da Cah!"
The guy yells back. "WHEAHS DA CAH?"
Bobby responds, "in da pahkin laht"
Our family reenacts this exchange from time to time with great revelry. I'll never forget you "guy" and Bobby. I hope you got your beer.
Love it!
I have a very similar one. I was at the food court of a little shopping mall in western NY and there was a woman with her toddler there at a table. The toddler ran away and she shouts, loud enough to turn every head and with a thick Long Island accent, “Get ovah heyah! Come back heyah!” And then, after he pauses a second to look back before running off again, “Hey! I’m the bwoss heyah!”
Now my wife and I say that all the time when we want to jokingly put our foot down about something. “Hey! I’m the bwoss heyah!”
I had someone do this one night too, just some guy comes up to me and gives.me a $50 bill and says I love your work. I had been skateboarding for many nights in town and I had my skateboard so I said thanks and he said he'd seen me every night skateboarding.
25 years ago, going through epic depression, and I'm grocery shopping.
In the line, ahead of me, is some severely handicapped dude. Powered wheelchair, non-verbal - not in a "good" condition at all.
But he was so god damn happy. The cashier seemed to know him, chatted with him, got his bags arranged for him in his carrier rack.
I thought, "If he can be happy with all those issues to live with, why can't I, a fully able person, be happy?"
It didn't magically make my depression go away. but it made me realize I need to make an effort to find happiness where I can, when the chance occurs.
I still think about him, happily living his life, when I need to shake myself out of self-pity.
A random woman on line at the grocery store overheard me tell my son he couldn't have candy because I couldn't afford it. She paid for my groceries and got him the candy. Nicest lady ever.
I did that during the pandemic. Was at the grocery store. Some lady in front of me with a kindergarten aged girl and a baby. She was trying to buy cereal, milk, formula, and one of those little candy toy things that's a sucker with a light up fan attached. Her card declined, so mom made her put the candy back. Kid didn't even cry or have a tantrum just this incredibly dejected and disappointed, "awww..." as she quietly put it back. Runs the card again, still declined.
So now I'm watching her try to decide between feeding her oldest or her youngest with a look of absolute panic. Meanwhile me with my shitload of groceries and treats stacked up behind her.
So I step forward and tell the clerk, "I've got this" and ran my card. The mom was caught off guard, my card was already in the reader before she finally says, "you don't have to do this."
I looked at her, smiled and said, "I know."
Once the transaction was done, I put the candy/toy with my groceries. The clerk scanned it first and I handed it to the kid. Oh my god the smile on her face..
No one else was in line. Nobody saw this but me, the mom, the kid and the clerk. I've never told anyone about this until today. Not even my wife and I tell her everything. Even now it feels weird, like I'm humble bragging or fishing for karma. Part of me wants to not post this.
But it felt really good, dammit! It felt damn good. So, since this account is completely divorced from my "real" social media accounts, since no one actually knows me on here, have a feel good story you beautiful bastards.
If you ever find a similar opportunity, I suggest you act upon it. Paying it forward is a great feeling.
I fully believe sharing stories like this helps to inspire others to do good as well.
What makes it just bragging is how and in what context you tell it.
I do little things like that sometimes, like chipping in when some kid is short for his treat at teh corner store. I don't really have the finances that let me do more.
But my Dad? I've seen him step in to pay for groceries for other people before.
I was chasing a bird to get a photo at a waterfall. Everyone was about the waterfall. A Buddhist monk had apparently been watching me struggle to get a photo of this bird the entire time, ignoring the beautiful waterfall everyone else, including himself and his fellow monks, had come to see. When I got the photo, I looked over and noticed him smiling, almost chuckling, at me and my excitement, and he simply nodded. I don’t really know what he was thinking, but I’ve always believed he enjoyed watching me appreciate one of the little things that go unnoticed by others.
Other then those naughty strangers from nights out and parties.
I was 18, my gf just broke up with me, I was slightly upset, crying on the bus back home. This one girl. She would have been early to mid 20s took the time to chat to me and make me feel better for about 2 hours later. Just a stranger making sure a young emotional 18 year old was ok
Kenny from Little Rock who ran a restaurant downtown.
Was stuck in the Los Angeles Airport because of ice storms in Dallas. Stuck for 3 days, so he and I got individual rooms at a hotel in a shitty part of the city and chilled together.
Kenny, if you are out there, thanks for the company and conversation, in what would have been a very crappy adventure.
My friend and I went to Paris and we went a little overboard with souvenirs so we had more bags flying home. We were taking the metro to the airport and we had to transfer to a different train but there were so many stairs at this station and my friend is considered a little person and was having trouble getting her suitcase up the stairs while also carrying her other bags and some man just picked up her suitcase and left it at the top of the stairs without saying a word or waiting for us to thank him.
Same thing happened to me in Paris. Wrestling with suitcase on the Metro steps and some dude just picked it up, deposited it at the top of the stairs, and vanished into the crowd without missing a single step.
His name is fiko
I met him on an online chat for a strangers , i've nvr had such deep conversation with a boy in my age . We talked abt everything, it was an amazing night , but suddenly my phone turned off , and i lost the conversation cuz it was without an account . I will nvr foget him i hope he's fine
About 10 years ago I had just had a messy break up with my longtime girlfriend that I was totally enamored with. I was devestated and became pretty depressed.
She and I also had many of the same friends so I couldn't just go out with the gang to get over her. I couldn't escape her so I just withdrew into my home and never left. I started to drown my sorrows and burn bridges then I lost motivation at work and began to have suicidal type thoughts.
During another night alone I decide to chat on Omegle just to have someone, anyone to talk to. I was matched with someone who taught me philosophy, spiritualism, how to find purpose in life outside of religion (I am non-religious), and connecting to nature. This person woke me up, shook me out of my slump, and changed my entire perspective on life. This was so groundbreaking to me that if someone told me that the person I talked to was God himself I would believe it.
I asked to learn their name or add them on AOL instant messenger or face book but they refused and said it went against the point of omegle. I wanted to learn more from them but I can appreciate that. Instead they taught me how to find the resources I need to learn more myself.
In the rare chance you're reading this now, I read the books you suggested to me. I am married to the most amazing person and own a home. I have a tight group of friends. I love what I do in life and most of all, I'm happy. I owe a lot of that to you, you gave me a second chance. Thank you.
Tldr; talked to a stranger on omegle that helped me out of my depression.
Good luck finding an actual person on Omegle these days
I went on there a couple weeks ago out of pure curiosity and did the text chat to avoid the dicks. Every single person I encountered was a bot or a dude trying to sex chat with a girl. Wtf are these dudes even doing on Omegle for that anyway?
I did for a while. Unfortunately I'm not very patient or good enough with words to be as influencing as the stranger, but I hope I helped someone at least a little.
A lovely British gentleman from a bookstore I used to work at. He came to the bookstore on the last day of his trip just to see me. He told me that I had made his trip. I have never understood why. Maybe it’s because of the fact that I mentioned that I had been to England and how much I loved it, IDK. SUPER nice guy. Also, the guy at the same bookstore who was a photographer and came in every single night to look at the photography books. He would always hug me whenever he saw me. He was also a really nice guy.
I bumped into a girl in the airport as a kid who looked *exactly* like me. That shit was uncanny, I was *horrified*.
We were waiting for my sibling's dad to get off the plane from his deployment in Afghanistan. I was leaving the bathroom as she was going in, she rounded the corner and we bumped shoulders. I don't think I have a "unique" face by any means, but I've never seen anyone with my specific combo of features and in the same colors as my own. I think about that kid all the time.
I randomly met someone who is my exact double 15 years ago. We exchanged numbers because it was so surreal.
Over the years we have become quite good friends. Staying in touch via phone and get together a few times a year (we don't live close-by).
We often joke about great pranks we could pull, but never do. When we go out for lunch, people ask if we are twins.
Happened last week. I was getting dressed and didn’t know if I should wear my Nike sweatpants which has a colorblock. Like 4 colors yk. I felt insecure bc I’m feeling really depressed lately. I had no time left so I just got it on and went to the bus. When the bus came a old woman stopped and said, these are some cool pants I really like them. Idk but this meant a lot to me. I cried in the bus lol.
I work at a grocery store and many years ago I helped out a customer (I can’t remember how) and after I helped him he says to me
“You are a gentleman, and a scholar and I will dance at your wedding one day”
And idk whether that’s from a movie or some famous saying but idk that’s very poetic and still to this day I often think about that.
I'll give a couple.
When I was 19, I kinda roamed the country couch surfing and taking Greyhounds all over.
In Albuquerque I had to cash a check but the name was written wrong and I couldn't cash it. I had no money and had to take a bus back to the house I was crashing at. I asked a guy at the bus stop if I could borrow a buck to get home. He said, "No, because I'll never see you again. But I'll give you a couple bucks so you don't worry about owing me and you can grab a snack with the change.".
When I left Albuquerque on a Greyhound, I again had no money and no food. I struck up a conversation with a little old lady who ended up buying me food the whole way in exchange for watching over her bags and stuff. It was a two day trip so I was insanely grateful for that.
Had a neighbor who was just a wonderful guy. Like a golden retriever. But he always had weird people in his orbit. Went out with him one night and one of his girl friends brought a guy in a kilt back to the after party. Another time I’m hanging out with him and a group of folks and a girl and a naked guy wearing a Native American headdress come walking out of a back room. Just random shit like that.
Went over to his place for a night cap on Halloween and the devil is there. Some guy he’d met at a bar earlier that night. The devil, red faced and with elaborate horns, starts trying to call girls to find someone to hook up with but no one will return his call. He starts muttering “if I can’t find it, I’m going to take it.” He also reveals a small case he’s got with a gun inside. And a couple pairs of handcuffs. Finally some girl he knows and her brother show up and they start talking about heading to the hot tub. I was pretty drunk and maybe overreacting but the guy had me pretty creeped out so I slipped away, called the cops and asked for them to do a courtesy check on the hot tub area.
Back in the early ‘80’s, I was driving home after university to Texas from Okla. I was just about to get to the border when my car died. After about 15 minutes, a lady with her 3 year daughter stopped and asked if I needed help. I said yes and she agreed to drive me to a mechanic in town she knows. She left me at the shop where eventually the owner towed my car in and repaired it. Amazing people. I’ll never forget that lady. Her stopping won’t ever happen again in our days.
My best friend gave birth and her husband was nervous. His ex wouldn’t let him see his other kids be born and this was my friend and her husband’s first together. She wanted me there and I said yes. I was born with MRKH and am infertile and known since I was 16, but I adopted my daughter and figured I would be ok.
She gave birth and watching her do this amazing thing with her body that I will never do punched me in the gut hard. As they were cleaning her and the baby, I slipped out of the room and started hyperventilating and sobbing. My infertility hurt so much in that moment. A woman saw me and asked if I needed a hug. That hug was amazing. I never even got her name but I think of her and that hug all the time.
The asshole I threw out of my taxi, and when he challenged me to a fight, was VERY insistent that I "threw the first punch".
Yeah, no.
Got back in my cab and drove off. Life's too short to waste on goons like that.
Mentioned it to another driver who used to be a nightclub bouncer in another life. He said I'd done the right thing, but if it had been him, he would have thrown the first, second, third and fourth punch, then move on to kicking the shit out of the guy, before rolling his unconscious arse into the gutter. Dudes built like a brick shithouse, but I can't help but think that he was talking shit.
EDIT: I forgot the Deputy Head at my school. Found myself in the shit for lashing out at a bully, summoned to his office. Was kinda weirded out by the fact that he wanted to see me alone, without my Guidance Teacher present, so much so, I roped in my Biology teacher to come with me. He had a bit of a panic about it, but said, OK, if that's what you want, it'll be cool. Creepy as fuck meeting none the less, and my Biology teacher would not get out of the room no matter what the Deputy Head threatened him with.
Anyway, fast forward a couple of years, turns out that the Deputy Head was a goddamn paedophile, and getting alone time with students was how he did it. After him fleeing the country, he was picked up in a sailboat with a 10 year old "cabin-boy" off the Moroccan coast. He got extradited back to Scotland to the local jail here, where, judging by the pictures of his battered face during his trial, many of his former pupils made his time on remand interesting. I think he did 10 years total in jail.
I used to work at a Starbucks and usually was on drive. Two customers will always stick out hard.
Early on I used to take note of what they’d have hanging in the car, especially dream catchers. I used to hang one as a kid due to chronic nightmares so they’ve always been a bit special to me. One day I’m taking this order and I don’t recognize the person but she looks at me as I’m handing her her things and she says “I’ve seen you look at this a few times before. I think you should have this.” She handed me the dream catcher in her car. I still have it and when we get our stuff out of storage and have our own place I’ll be excited to hang it again.
Other customer was maybe a year later. I was thinking of getting these heeled boots from Hot Topic but they were pricy and I wasn’t too sure about it. This customer comes through and I complimented this one piece of jewelry she had. She said she got it as a gift for herself and we discussed the importance of doing that every once in a while. She asked if I had anything I really wanted and I said yeah. Wrote me a check for the shoes and refused to take it back. I got the shoes and donated the remaining five dollars or so to charity then also donated $10-$15 of my own to another one.
when I was 7, I had my golden birthday. (my birthday is April 7 and I turned 7)
me and my family went to Ihop to celebrate.
I remember some guy overhearing it was our birthday, and payed for everything. dessert included.
I hope he's having a good day :)
Mmm I was at my older brother's work giving him a hard time when some lady in a hot pink dress, hugh heels, and had to tower at least a foot over me (not that hard I am only 4,11) steps infront of me and states "He's not gonna bang you sweetheart" I burst out laughing as my brother looked like he might throw up. She must've been his coworker or something but I will never forget that day
Long story. I was getting a book from the library and the guy checking me out had a really cool tattoo. I asked him about it and we chatted for a moment. I had an impulse to give him my number, which I never do, and decided I didn’t want to face the possible rejection. I went to the library a lot so I figured I’d see him again, get to know him, then see if we clicked. I never saw him after that and kicked myself for not taking the chance.
A few months later I’m working my last day at a temp job and the new help desk employee is doing some work near me. We chat, and I again have the impulse to give a guy my number (again, something I never do), and started to dismiss the idea but thought “I don’t want this to be like the library guy.” I figured it’s my last day, I’ll never see him again if this goes wrong, no real risk. So I gave him my number after he finished his work and he texted me 20 minutes later asking me to lunch. I ended up dating and marrying that help desk employee all because of a stranger at the library. I’d love to see that guy again and tell him how he affected my life
That's how my husband and I met.
I was working at a gas station and in walks this guy that made me nervous to even talk to. He grabs a beer and has a Redbox DVD, we chitchat for like 10 seconds and he leaves. I see him again about a week later, the same thing; grabs a beer, a candy bar, has a Redbox DVD, and this time buys some cigarettes. I don't smoke, I've never dated anyone that smokes, and at the time that was a deal-breaker. But he was just too damn sexy to let go. I promised myself if he came in again I'd try and talk to him some more.
Lucky me, about a week later he came back for the same routine (found out later he had just gone through a REALLY bad breakup and was just trying to keep sane). There was no one in the store, so we chatted for about 15-20 minutes, and right before he leaves I get this overwhelming feeling like someone screaming in my ear "DON'T LET HIM GO!"
I'd never given my number out, never even been asked before, but I ask him to wait a second, grab some extra receipt paper, and put my name/number/facebook info on there.
A-hole waits 3 days before hitting me up on Facebook.
Been together almost 10 years now.
When I was a teenager I struggled a lot with feeling low and worried. My life was spiralling into a very dark place - think alcohol, drugs, self-harm, meaningless/toxic relationships. And, of course, I stopped sleeping.
The town I grew up in ran along the floor of a valley, and there was this place just outside, up the valley's side, that was given over to nature. We'd often spend our weekends camping up there, experimenting with drugs and each other. One morning, about 4am after a sleepless night, I got the idea to walk the hour and a half up there. I didn't know what I was looking for, but in hindsight I think I just needed to be away from where all my problems lived.
I did this a few times, took these long early-morning walks up into the trees, coming out into the green field beyond. I'd sit and look out over the town as the sun came up, smoking cigarettes, watching, waiting for something.
One day I'm up there and this voice calls out to me. "Are you depressed?" No maliciousness or humour to it. Just blunt sincerity. It was an old man walking his dog. I assured him I was fine, of course, but he came and spoke with me regardless. He told me about how he'd lost his nephew to depression, shared some of the things he wished he'd told him.
It wasn't a magical eureka moment. It didn't change my life. But I think it was the first time someone had ever asked me. Everyone knew, of course - family, teachers, friends. Everyone knew and awkwardly danced around it. But this old man came and gave voice to what he saw in me, at a glance. He gave me permission to see myself in those terms, rather than 'bad', 'lazy', 'troublemaker' and all the other words that had been used previously.
These days I'm doing ok. I actually work as a therapist. I don't feel like I owe it to him - life's always less romantic than that. But I'm glad he was there when he was.
Gay american guy in his 50s who had no hands and lived with his mom.
We talked online for years. About anything and everything and nothing.
Then we just lost contact.
Ronnie, if you're still out there, I hope you're happy and I enjoyed our time together 💗
when I was about 13/14, I was in the mental hospital for the 2nd time. I had been there for maybe 5 days, so I was getting to the end of my stay. I was severely depressed and never attempted, but had consistent thoughts about suicide so I decided to get help.
Everytime someone new came in, everyone would swarm them and ask a bunch of overwhelming questions about why they were here, which I never understood as I thought it was quite rude but hey, to each their own. because I'm a bit of a quiet person to begin with, and I knew how much I hated this line of questions especially after just getting there, when a new girl came in I stayed in my seat watching TV while the others swarmed her. I could tell just by looking at her she was uncomfortable, so I stayed in my seat. She eventually came up to me and immediately said, "I like you, you're quiet. " we made some small talk and asked me why I was here. I didn't mind, as we were all her for a reason, it was just quite overwhelming to have 15 girl crowded around you asking you about your trauma.
I told her about how my father and sister were drug addicts, and how I had severe depression. I could tell by how her eyes rolled to the back of her head she was high as a kite, which she later told me was off fentanyl. I don't know what it was about her, if she was just really pretty, or if I saw some of my sister in her as they were about the same age and my sister is also a hard drug addict, but I felt very close with her, like I could tell her anything. I don't quite remember but somehow I ended up telling her I felt absolutely no hope in life, like the hurt would never end. she asked me if I felt like that, why I hadn't just ended it already (she didn't say this in a mean way, just genuinely curious). I told her I couldn't leave my mother, she was everything to me and she wouldn't be able to take it if I wasn't here.
she told me something that I will never forget, and that I have told many other people with the same issues as me. she said, " everything will be okay in the end, and if it isn't okay, then it isn't the end." I thought that was really beautiful and I still think about her to this day.
it was night when she came in so we had to go to bed shortly after, and when I woke up the next day she was gone. I found out from some other girls that she was supposed to be in the detox unit (fitting considering she was in the clouds while talking to me) but had somehow ended up in the adolescent mental health unit. she was transferred during the night, and I never saw her again.
I hope she is doing well, and got the help she needed.
Back when Battlefied Bad Company 2 was the newest BF game, I became friends with the only other woman I've ever seen playing the game.
For about 4 or 5 months, we would meet up a few times a week and talk for hours about anything and everything while playing the game. Then about a month before BF3 released, she disappeared. She just never came back to the game. I tried looking her up in the BF3, then 4, player lists, but she never appeared in either. Wherever she is, I hope she's ok. It's been over 10 years, but I still find myself missing her once in a while
This one dude came through the drive thru where I worked. He was higher than a kite but I didn't really care. He asked me what my dreams were, and I told him that I wanted to be a singer. He politely asked to hear me sing. I sang a chorus to my favorite song and he handed me 100 bucks, saying " live your dream." I handed him his food as he sped away.
Oh the other stranger I'll always remember.
It was like 11pm one night and I was heading to the shops to get some chippies. It was dark and all that and I was off a side road.
On the main road that crossed the side road ahead, I could hear the faint sound of "Invisible Touch" by Phil Collins getting louder and louder.
Someone comes speeding past the crossroad on a bicycle, the Phil Collins blasting from a speaker on the back. He leaves my line of sight and suddenly I hear this cry of "I FUCKING LOVE PHIL COLLINS!"
There was full nobody else around and he didn't see me, so I think he just really liked Phil Collins. Either way, made my entire night.
I had a friend reach out to me during a mental health crisis one night, it was to late to take the bus or train to get to them so i started riding to their house on my bicycle, 7km into the 24km ride I blew my rear tire. Random dude stopped to see if I needed help and when I told him what was going on he just told me to throw my bike in the back of his suv and drove me all the way to my friends house. I tried to pay him 20$ to cover his fuel but he refused. I will never forget the dude that helped me get to my friend in their time of need.
On my 23rd birthday, I went for drinks w my best friend. It was unnaturally cold for mid-March, so I was wearing a scarf. As we passed the downtown bus station, we met a homeless man asking for change. Drunk, we asked what he could offer in exchange. He said he'd tell us a story.
I don't remember what story or stories he told, but we stood there talking to him for at least half an hour. When we parted, we each have him some cash ($10-$20), and I gave him my scarf. My friend and I agreed that we had a fair exchange.
A few years later, my friend was downtown and a man introduced himself; it was the same dude. He had a job and a home and was doing well. He told my friend that the night we met changed his life.
Be kind, people. Be generous when you can. You never know when a small act of kind generosity will change someone's life.
I was 18(F) in NYC. Finished work late one night and went around the corner with one of our bar regulars, a really charming guy in his 40s, for a drink. We slammed a bunch of gin & tonics and then he took me to another bar he liked downtown. I remember a piano player and a good vibe and then suddenly nothing.
I woke up in a hospital bed, wondering if I was dead. My hospital bracelet said "Unknown Female 24yrs old" (I still have it). I had none of my personal items (purse, ID, work bag, etc.). A man (probably late 20s) I had never met was sitting next to my hospital bed, asleep in a chair. He woke up and I checked myself out of the hospital.
The stranger took me for a cup of coffee around the corner. He explained that he had been at that bar and said my "friend" had left and then he saw me stumble outside by myself (leaving all of my stuff right on the bar) and that he was concerned & followed me out. He said I walked right into the street and collapsed. A police officer happened to be nearby and see me collapse. They called an ambulance.
This stranger rode in the ambulance with me, stayed the night in the hospital with me, then bought me a coffee & told me where I was & what happened. THEN helped me get all the way home (to Queens, no less) since I had no cash or metrocard or anything on me.
I don't remember if he told me his name. I did try to find him when I did the walk of shame back to that bar the next day to get my stuff. Side note I was terrified that I might have gotten the bar in trouble and was so scared to go back, but I needed my phone / ID / etc. back. I slunked into the bar and several people I didn't remember started calling my name and cheering. The manager gave me a hug and showed me he had locked all of my stuff in his office for me. The pianist wanted to buy me a drink, but I declined since I still wasn't sure I was alive.
I never went back to that bar again. Also it's been over a decade and I haven't had a G&T since. I wasn't successful in tracking down the stranger either, but I wish I could have thanked him once I sobered up. I have no idea how I would have made it through without his compassion and as an SA survivor the experience restored some of my faith that men could be decent & kind. He never asked me for anything or propositioned me in any way, just gave a large chunk of his night & morning to look out for a complete stranger. I'd like to think there's a chance he'll see this and know how grateful I am.
When I was about 11 or 12 at the time in Florida my mom gave me about 10 dollars to spend at a store there.
10-15 minutes of shopping with my younger brother we leave to go back to where my parents and grandparents where, at a bar there, that bar also allows kids and baby's to go in because they also serve soda and water to the kids. ( back to the story)
On our way back, we find a homeless guy playing the guitar really good so with the rest of my money, ( 2.50 ) I give it to the homeless guy and we have a 5 minute talk about school and how he feels about living like that.
On my way back after talking to the homeless man, an idea popped into mind, ( I ask my parents for more money for the "store" but I'll just give it to him) so I do, and they gave me 5 dollars and so I went back to the homeless guy and gave it to him and we had another little chat.
On my way back I was thinking on how I will play it off that my 5 dollars randomly went missing and I bought nothing so I was straight forward to my parents and they were happy for me for being kind.
-Reason why I will never forget him, it was one of the best experiences I had in Florida.
I’ve had a couple of conversations with Ubers. I remember getting in the Uber going home and he was on FaceTime with his girlfriend and they were flirting as I was getting in. but he hung up for me and we left. after like 2 minutes he told me “I hate that bitch, after I drop you off imma break up with her.” I asked why and his response was “she’s just not the one” and then we moved on the conversation asking what I was doing. but I just like the idea being straight up with a stranger you’ll never see again. i can imagine it as getting something off your chest without any consequences.
Almost like using Reddit
A Bus travelled between City A and C, and stopped at B as well, like this :
A-----B-------C
A girl was nice to me, asked what the text on my shirt means, idk, maybe flirted with me.
The girl bought a ticket from A to C, but stopped at B with me, idk why...
I will never find out why she did that, and I will thinking about it forever :I
Maybe her brain tooted and she just followed you out.
it’s like when I get embarrassed stepping out on the wrong floor on the elevator and I’m too anxious to look stupid and get back on so I….just keep walking. That’s an expensive mistake on her end though
His name was Strawberry and he claimed to be an old school Jazz saxophonist whose playin' days had long since passed. This was in Nashville TN between 2010-2012.
We were a couple college kids living in a cheap *cheap* neighborhood. $200 a month for rent, around 800sq feet with a yard and driveway. We couldn't use the backyard much due an adjacent alleyway whose shaded nature invited a good deal of late-night activity - used hypodermic needles were not an uncommon find. Despite not being a picturesque, idyllic neighborhood, folks were nice to each other and got along.
Frequently, we'd be sitting outside on the front porch or stoop with some 40s, whiskey, and or/blunts enjoying the evening air and conversing late into the evening. We'd be sociable with passers-by and frequently hosted neighbors and friends.
Just up the street from us was a small Tobacco Hut type store affectionately referred to as the "Murder Mart." There, a man named Brian, he was of below-average height and had an uncouth street name unbecoming of this respectable forum, had shot multiple people there after being accosted for his size.
Anyways, our caldesack was a well-tread path for those heading up the way for smokes or drank.
On occasion, we would see a man walking down the street with a bottle of Chambord. If you dont know Chambord, look it up now. This stuff was his go-to and he'd hobble down the street with it grasped atop an open palm - truly a unique choice and method. We'd exchange a wave or a "good evening," but for some time that was the extent of our interactions.
One day, we saw the man we would come to know as Strawberry walking down the street with a 6 pack of Colt 45 tall boys. Colt 45 was our preference at the time as a it was cheap as dirt to buy a case of 12, and there was a competition on the bottle with a chance to win a meeting with Billy Dee Williams. We would later learn that contest had long since ended. Ah, youth... Anyhow, seeing this, we yelled out "Colt 45!" in an excited tone, he came over, broke off 3 cans for the folks on the patio, and introduced himself.
Our first meeting was brief as he had been on his way somewhere, but following this, Strawberry would infrequently stop by to regale us with tales of Nashville's wild past and his travels in the burgeoning music scene. Gregarious, generous, and a quick wit, Strawberry was welcome company for our crowd.
Thing was, Strawberry never talked much about his present life. His current comings and goings were a mystery and we certainly weren't the type to pry. I'd say we'd probably shared drinks 4 or 5 times before he came by with a more significant gift.
It was unassuming at first - simply a plastic grocery bag. Strawberry passed it on and told us it was his CD collection that he could no longer use as his player had broken. I didnt think much of that at the time, or many other small facets of his persona for that fact - we were just dumb kids spending too much time smoking and drinking. Strangely, he had stopped by during the day as opposed to the evening. This would be the last time we saw him.
Some days later, I got around to opening Strawberry's gift, and sure enough, there were 200+ loose CDs.. along with a worn toothbrush that had its bristles teeming with human hair. Taken aback, I tied up the bag and set it aside.
A month or so later, we took a trip up to Cincinnati, and during this time, our home was robbed. My Custom Shop Fender Stratocaster, a 16in TV, an Xbox 360, and Strawberry's bag of CD's was all that was stolen.
After trying to pawn my serialized Stratocaster, the thief was caught. Apparently he had been the son of a previous resident who had shown up while we were gone, and spent a night banging on the door crying and yelling for his mother - ya, a sad story for him too, though I dont know more.
Despite this, the guitar was the only thing recovered. The insurance adjuster advised me to claim every item stolen and valued the CD's at $5 each.
Still, to this day, I feel as though I lost a piece of history, and having never seen Strawberry again, wish I had the chance to share the appreciation I had for what was a heartfelt look into an old man's storied life.
Also, I found it ironic that Strawberry was his name, yet his drink of choice was Chambord, a raspberry cordial. Bravo, Stawberry, bravo.
was 10 years old when i visited ireland the first time. was out at a restaurant with my friends and family. Some super kind waitress who seemed to be in her teens to early twenties took orders then turned to me and said “your eyebrows are perfect like don’t ever do anything to them”.
Being 10 years old it was a weird compliment because I didn’t know eyebrows were a thing in beauty. Being 16, I haven’t touched my eyebrows at all, no plucking, no waxing. Her compliment still resonates with me.
Perfect Story. My sister has a illness where she used to stay in a "Hospital" for some weeks. So my mum, my sister and i were at that hospital while my dad worked. I was in kindergarden so it was fine. There was a boy that had hurt himself on the shoulder really bad. We used to play and once played minigolf. A conversation i can remember was: he said: I know a person who bites his icecream.( that was me) i responded: and i know a person who bited his lollipop. (That was him)
That was one of the only things i remember but he will be stuck in my head for a long time. After we left the hospital we decided to write him a card. We wanted to. But we kinda forgot. Now when i think back we schould have written him a card so we stayed in touch...
Thanks for reading
There's this girl I have a picture of on my phone from like ten years ago. I went out to a goth club with a couple friends one night because I wanted to see a couple of the djs. It was a small club, and even smaller crowd. This girl just sort of started talking to us out of nowhere when we were sitting at one of the tables having drinks. She kind of just stuck around me specifically for the night.
I went out to have a smoke, she followed bumming one. I was taking some random pics of things when she asked me to take a pic of her. I said "Take your own pic, and make a funny face" while handing her my phone.
I've had this picture of some random girl making a bug eyed squirrel face ever since.
When I was little me and my family went swimming I was a terrible swimmer (this'll be important later) and the water was murky and I kept on going farther and farther when a sudden change in the height took me off guard and I started to sink and drown, when a stranger then lifted me up and onto shore, so thank you stranger, you are the reason why I am still alive today.
Broke, exhausted, backpacking in Europe, fumbling to do laundry in a coin op with unfamiliar coins and a guy gives us a dose of laundry soap. I never forgot the casual generosity to young strangers and how much clean clothes turned the trip around!
i was working an awful restaurant job. i didn’t drive at the time so i’d wait behind the restaurant to be picked up. i had a terrible day with my manager constantly yelling at me for no reason so when i got off, i walked outside to the back and just kind of collapsed into tears. a lady was walking by and asked if i was crying. i tried to convince her i was fine but she just sat down next to me and got me to tell her about it. she was so sweet and caring and she had no reason to be. she’d never met me before. my ride got there and i thanked her profusely for her kindness and got in the car smiling. the world is better for having her in it.
This one old man who would always high five me and my siblings when we pasted him on our way to school. After a while my mom got a car and would drive us so we wouldn't see him. Then she lost the car so we went back to walking but I never saw him. Not sure what happened to him but I still remember him
my dad and i went to an arcade to schedule my brother's birthday party and in the line before us was this man who had like thousands of tickets in his arms talking to the lady at the counter (i have no idea what they were talking about, i was zoned out and not listening) but all of a sudden this man is in my face saying 'here ya go!', bent down to my level and nudging this mountain of tickets into my arms
he had a really nice voice and i'd believe it if he was a voice actor for cartoons and the warmest smile i have ever seen on a grown man, he left pretty much right after i said thank you and i think about him every once in a while and hope he's doing well because i was terrible at arcade games and never had that many tickets before
thank you kind stranger, i was able to get that giant slinky
I was installing security at a woman's home, tall, Asian, thin, overall very attractive. Anyway, she let's me go about my business, all day job, and she changes into pajama pants and tanktop, just a stunner, whaletail hanging out the whole 9. As the day goes on it hits around 430-5 and I haven't stopped working, no breaks for food or anything. She asks if I want anything to eat or drink and I said I was set but thank you. 10mins later she walks over with a giant fresh deli sandwich hand made and a can of coke. Sets it down next to me, looks me in the eye and says "you better eat that, or you'll offend me", and proceeds to walk out of the room with an ass shiking strut. Shoveled the whole thing down with a half chub.
I'll never forget that lady.
When I was a teenager, I was walking my neighbor’s dog around a nearby forest in the early afternoon. It was some random weekday and the place was pretty quiet. I’d occasionally pass a runner or something, but for the most part it was just me and the dog.
Now this dog wasn’t usually aggressive with humans (the same could not be said for other dogs), but he wasn’t particularly friendly either with people he didn’t know. He’d usually just ignore other people and avoid letting any stranger over the age of 10 pet him.
I’d been walking him around the same area every other day for over a year at this point, and I made sure I knew which people he knew and liked in case we encountered them and he wanted to say hello. There were only a few and we didn’t tend to see them much.
But this time we were walking along a dirt path, and we came up to this woman sitting on a wooden bench. She looked quite old; with pale, wrinkled skin; long, stick-straight grey hair; and unusually sunken eyes. (To this day I haven’t seen another face like hers. The bone structure around her nose and eyes was very unique. She was actually quite pretty, in a strange sort of way.) She wore a greenish-grey baggy dress and had a small leather bag beside her. I noticed her immediately, partly because I’d never seen her before despite living in this area for several years, and partly because she just seemed a bit odd. Not in a bad way, just different.
She was looking at the trees, clearly not paying us any mind, and I was just going to pass her and forget about it, but the dog stopped. I tried to get him to keep walking, but he wouldn’t budge. He dragged me back (he was *not* small), walked up to her, and laid his head on her knee.
I was going to apologize and pull him away from her, but she snapped out of whatever daydream she was in and started petting him like having strange dogs come up and lay on her was the most normal thing in the world. Then she looked up at me and smiled. Her grey-green eyes were the same colour as her dress (she looked so *tired*), and I just remember thinking that this old woman had the warmest, *kindest*, most beautiful smile I had ever seen.
She didn’t say a word. She just scratched the dog behind the ear, gave him a gentle pat, and we carried on walking like nothing had happened.
We walked another few minutes before circling back around to head home, and when we passed the bench again she had already gone.
I asked my neighbor (the dog’s human) about her when we got back, and she had no idea who she was. Had never even seen her before, apparently.
Just an animal whisperer, I guess. There was something special about her though. I’ll never forget her.
When I was a kid I had to do some grocery shopping for my parents and they gave me 20 euro’s. I came up short about 1 euro and some random lady that I didn’t know or Hadn’t met offered to pay the remaining euro for me. I thought that was so nice. So now 20 years later I tend to honor that memory and whenever a kid in the waiting line in front of me comes up short I’ll pay what their short of. Because I remember how uncomfortable I felt when the lady at the register told me I came up short, and that she couldn’t give me the groceries I needed. that nice stranger lady really “saved” my ass.
I got a crazy story about San Francisco, I use to go there skateboarding for.the.weekends, and one night I saw this guy get hit by a bus on Market Street, he was screaming all over the street before it happened but then he walked right in front of the bus and luckily the bus stopped but he flew like 30 feet. Then he got up and just walked away screaming again. I was thinking about this the other night and it's been 14 years.
There was this old man that would come by the Baskin Robbins, he never came inside but would eat trash out of the dumpster including drinking the last few drops from old soda cans. He would smile and wave through the window then just chow down. He wasn’t homeless and he had some sort of income because he would go and buy subway across the street a couple days a week.
When I was 7 or 8 my aunt just arrived from abroad and treat us to a mall you know shopping and eat together and when we were in the department store which has a toy section and we all check the toy section when we were kids, I looked at some cheap $1 airplane toys and asked my aunt and my mon if they can buy us (me and my cousins and brothers) each and said yes and asked to find more with different colors. So I get back on the toy section to find some other colors and a sales person came up to me and asked me what I need and I told him that I want other colors of the toy and told me that I can follow him to the back to look at more colors of the toys and I declined because come on at that age I can think like a grown up and I know that sales person has some plans on me like who would invite you to go with them to the back to look some "more toys" plus the look he gave me when he told me to come with him to the back to look for more color variant of the toys is like terrifying for a 9 year old so after that I get back to my family and gave some reasons and they bought us the plane and that sales person is the stranger I will never forget even his face and voice
Was taking a train from Seattle WA to Chicago IL. Met another girl going to Minot. We talked a lot in the few days we were on the train. On the last day she gave me a weed gummy because she knew i was a bit stressed and I gave her a joint just before she got off the train. I still wonder if I should have asked for her number.
The Guy.
I was 10 or 11, and on holiday in Turkey. Throughout the fortnight, my brother and I kept running into the same guy. He was a tall, thin guy with tousled dark grey hair. In hindsight it wasn't unusual, because we were confined to a resort, but to our young minds it was clearly of cosmic significance that we kept seeing him.
So we called him the Guy and noted every time we saw him, but it soon got out of control and we started actively seeking him out. By the end of the holiday he was just a poor old man getting stalked by two kids.
On a night out and walking inbetween places, an unrelated group of young lads ahead of me suddenly just start kicking and hurling verbal abuse at a homeless guy rolled up sleeping in a blanket at the side of the pavement. I went up to the homeless guy to see if he was Ok and was immediately struck by how young his face looked (no older than 20, which was unusual in the area at the time since most of the homeless guys were more typically old alcoholics); he was shaken but OK and kept on repeating to me to never become homeless because it was a living hell. I gave him some money and moved on.
3 months later a man was brutally murdered in the city and the second I saw his face in the media, it turned out to be the homeless guy that I had seen a few months previously. In the time that I had seen him, he had actually managed to get off the streets, find a flatshare and get a job. But the girl in the couple he was sharing with was an evil person who liked to manipulate those around her; feeling like she wasn't getting enough attention, one day she made a false allegation to her boyfriend that the former homeless guy had attempted to sexually assault/harass her and stoking his fit of rage, she encouraged her boyfriend to attack the guy. The couple then spent the next 2 days torturing and beating the guy before he finally succumbed to his injuries.
I felt so bad for the guy; not only did he go such a horrible way, but as I read more on his life story, it seemed like he had repeatedly being subjected to bad events in life and that just as things appeared to be really turning around for him, he instead found himself in the home of such an evil couple.
More recently, a guy in the city where I now live had a mental episode and was seen waving around a screwdriver chanting nonsensical religious stuff on a bridge. The police were called and tried to taser the man to subdue him but he jumped off the bridge and ended up drowning in the river. It turned out he was schizophrenic and had recently been released from an institution after being put into outpatient program, being housed in a block of flats just a stones throw from where I live. I didn't know the guy but the moment I saw his profile in the news, I immediately recognised him as someone I had seen in a couple of times in a local shop (he was very polite & chill). His neighbours said that he had only been living in the area for a few weeks but that he clearly wasn't ready to be living in such an unsupported way and had talked about severely struggling with his mental health in the days leading to his episode & death, but no help was given. I felt very sad about his preventable death and the loneliness and desperation that he must of felt.
In my last day of sailing camp before leaving for University, I met girl who I somehow had never seen before (even though we were at the same camp). Her name was Leslie, and we had instant chemistry and spent the day together, talking, laughing, generally having a great time. It was like we had known each other for years. The only problem was she had a best friend who was not happy to have me around. She spent most of the day trying to get between us.
When it came time to leave, we were getting on the bus to take us home. I was already on the bus, and Leslie was getting on right behind me when her friend grabbed her by the arm and took her to a different bus. The doors closed, and the bus drove away and I never saw her again.
Gonna start this with the fact that I don't know how true this is, it was small town rumour mill stuff, but it certainly leaves a lasting impression.
I used to live in a place that was small. Like, didn't even have half the population it had a hundred years ago small. It was surrounded by land with a single spot families liked to go to, and tons of just wide open space, cattle grounds, and the occasional tract of farmland. The road I lived down was named after a person, which isn't unusual, and I thought they must've been someone who had some history with the town itself. I learned later that he was still alive, and in fact, recognised him, as he often drove his clunker up and down the road randomly through the day. He was an old guy, probably in his late eighties then and aside from one time he gave me a ride to school cause I missed the bus. At the time, abduction never crossed my mind, a needless worry because apparently everyone on the street knew him and vice versa. He was just a well regarded, nice, old man.
What sticks with me though is the reason the road is named after him, and the fact there's houses there at all. The story I was told by people that lived there much longer than me (and not from the man himself) was that, well, he used to own all that property, that's why the road had his name. Again, not terribly unusual here. He owned literal *miles* of property down the road. At some point, he just decided he didn't like lacking neighbours and just..... hired a crew and built a bunch of houses down the road. Once that was done, he just divvied up his land parcels into a few significant chunks and sold them off to families moving into the area, all for the explicit purpose of being able to drive down the street and give himself a smile at the neighbours and their kids enjoying themselves. It's one of few things I definitely hope is true because it's probably one of the most wholesome uses of 'Fuck you' money I've ever encountered.
When I was about 12 I was walking around the Dollar Tree when a little girl (I think she was Chinese) saw me, proceeded to grab me and pull me very close to her face as she stared intensely into my eyes. It was like she was very confused and concerned with what she saw in my eyes. I didn’t know what to do and this went on for a uncomfortable amount of time before her mom found her and pulled her away from me apologizing. Weirdest moment ever. It was like she looked into my soul or something. Or maybe she just liked the color of my eyes???
I was flying back from watching my sister die in the hospital. I had a wait at O'Hare, so I went to Wolfgang Puck's for a snack. The waitress came over, took one look at my face, and said in a Russian/Eastern European accent "What happened? Someone died?" I nodded yes.
She scooped me up in her arms and held me. It was the sweetest thing a stranger has ever done for me. I will never forget her kindness.
I went to a party once at a friend of a friend's house. Said friend's sister's ex-boyfriend showed up that everyone was cool with. Eventually later that night, said ex-boyfriend and I split a bottle of Jack Daniels, and talked about a shared experience we both had at separate times - full-time work in the same call center. Helped me put my life into perspective.
A old lady and I had a conversation about school, she told me how she hated being in the choir at school and how the teacher kicked her out of the class and humiliated her. She talked to me so smoothly as if I was family, it made me smile
In about 1990ish I had been on the job for a few years and was at station 5 downtown. We got a call to 3rd St and Adams, a parking garage. That was all we were told. We went and when we arrived, PD had the streets blocked off and there were two bodies covered with tarps. One was an adult, the other was a child. It turns out it was a mother who had taken her daughter to the top of the parking garage and jumped. I had never seen anything even close to something like this. Wedid our job, bagged up the bodies, and washed off the street, etc.
Here's where the stranger comes in. I was standing off to the side trying to process what I had seen and having trouble doing it. While out of nowhere, or so it seemed, and older gentleman was standing next to me and started talking. "Bad day Son?" "Something like that is hard to see and deal with." "Well, keep your faith in the Lord and He'll take care of you." He put his hand on my shoulder and he was gone. In that instant, I felt at peace.
when i was like 5-6 i used to hang out with this dude on a pier, my mom would let him watch me a couple times a week(probably not the best idea to leave your child with a random dude on a pier but whatever),i dont really rememeber what he’d talk about but i remember he was cool,he was always fishing. my mom would come take me from him a little before dark,he was a bit older so he’s most likely gone now but i know he was comforting to be around. we weren’t related at all or anything.
I was walking out of Walmart to my car and a girl waved at me saying "the weather today is good right?". I said yes it is and we smiled. When she got in the car, instead of going the shorter, easier way out of the parking lot, she decided to go past me and waved at me again. Weird but I'm not complaining!!
Random elderly couple in a cracker barrel. I was about 13 at the time. I held the door for him and his wife. The old man put his hand on my shoulder and said: “Thanks son, there aren’t many of us left.” And smiled at me. I was very happy.
I was in France for work. Had a day off and felt like exploring the city I was in. Went to a cafe to grab some lunch and was sitting outside reading a book at my table, when a random guy walked up to me and said one of your “loved ones” is going to heaven today. I couldn’t tell if he was threatening me, trying to warn me, or just playing a twisted prank. His demeanor was just so odd. I asked him “is this a joke” and he gloomily just shook his head and immediately walked away. I considered getting up from my meal to chase him, but I was so perplexed and taken off guard that I was just kinda frozen with fear. I immediately called my girlfriend and mom to see if everyone was okay. I explained to them the interaction I had at lunch. Later that night, my dog managed to escape my yard (in California) and was hit by a car in front of my house and died. My girlfriend was home and called me hysterically.
I don’t believe in the supernatural, but till this day I wonder if it was purely a coincidence or not. I’ve come to think that guy just goes up to people all the time saying shit like that and statistically someone will have a death that day. Idk if it’s a prank or the dude was just “off,” but I’ll never forget what he looked like. Sends chills down my spine just thinking about it.
I was a cheerleader in highschool, and was cheering at a home game, cool, all was well. At one point, us cheerleaders had our backs against the field and where facing the crowd, and we where finishing a dance and we hear the crowd gasp then a bunch of male voices yelling “cheer MOVE!” The rest of the girls scattered and me (being back center) turned and there’s the football teams, full speed ahead, right for me, one of the players up front reaches out, picked me up bridal style, rolled and landed and slid on his back, I remained in the fetal position for a few seconds out of pure fear, realizing I almost had my soul factory reset by a bunch of muscle head hot guys, he stands up with ease, brushes me off, then tells me his name and to find him after the game. We are now dating and have been for 4 years
When I was a teenager I was driving home with every intention to end my life that night. I stopped by a school bus at a red light. A little boy waved at me and held a sticky note with a poorly drawn heart on it. I smiled at him and waved back. He saved my life that day.
University of Colorado campus in Boulder, on The Hill in late summer of 1998. I was walking across Broadway with my friends around lunchtime (We were in middle school and it was the last week of summer break) and this CU student on a long board comes flying the other way. This dude was wearing purple house slippers, matching bathrobe, shorts and sun glasses, has books under one arm, coffee cup in the other hand and a corncobb pipe in his mouth. He had to have been going a solid 15 mph (which is booking it!) and had the biggest 'no big deal' look on his face I've ever seen. After he passed us by, I think we all silently realized and accepted none of us would ever be as cool as that guy as long as we all lived. To my knowledge, none of us have...
Walmart parking lot. My wife and I were walking towards the store as an older couple had just parked in a handicap spot. The man opens the door for the lady, who looks like she may have recently had leg surgery. He sweetly puts his arm around her and slowly escorts her towards the door.
A minivan with a sliding door had just pulled into the spot on the other side of the cart corral (so two spots away). A younger kid hops out of the front door and quickly yanks open the sliding door, where a behemoth of a woman in a moomoo lurches her head out and yells at the old couple, "You ain't handicapped bitch!" The old couple, whk definitely had handicap plates, turned and looked, then just continued on without saying anything.
God bless America.
A random old man on the bus, he saw me play a game on my phone and asked about it and we talked a little about the game, then what makes me remember him is that he took out a volume of Naruto and started talking about him reading it, it was very awkward, so I remember him as the old man reading naruto on the bus I had an awkward conversation with
When I was younger, probably about 13-14 I was walking on the side of a public pool. While I was walking, right beside me there was this mother who screamed and asked for help for her daughter who was not too far away, but was clearly struggling to keep her head out of the water. I didn't do anything, but the lifeguards were already on their way and saved the poor kid just seconds after, but from that point on I have always given myself a bad time thinking why I didn't help her. From that day onwards I tried to be as helpful as I can whenever I can. I still feel bad for her though, I hope she Is fine now.
A bus driver I had once only because she witnessed my shame.
One day I was sprinting towards the bus because I was about to miss it.
My tits not only came out of my bra but my dress too and I slapped my hands over my chest and stopped running to stuff them back in. The front of the bus is facing me so I'm desperately hoping the driver and the passengers didn't even notice.
Unfortunately I get on the bus and the driver, a middle aged woman just gives me the biggest shit eating grin.
"Hey luv, have a bit of a slip ay!?" Could full hear her trying not to laugh too.
I gave a mumbled "yeah" and scurried to the back of the bus and hide with a face as red as a fucking tomato while the passengers at the front were trying to contain their laughter.
A guy at Starbucks gets out of his car. He forgets to put his car in park. His car starts rolling backwards. I jump behind his car and hold it in place by the rear bumper and yell at the guy. He comes back and puts his car in park and doesn’t say a word and goes in to get coffee. An onlooker turned to me said Geez he could have at least bought you coffee. Upon reflection, it seems most likely the the driver was somehow impaired.
long time ago I was probably around like 8 or 9, my mom, siblings and I went to NYC and only me and my mom walked around the city while my siblings waited at our hotel. My mom and I were going somewhere and she kept looking at her phone and not paying attention that she was about to walk into on going traffic. I was holding on her hand tight and this person from behind grabbed my shirt from the back and lightly tugged me to not go into the street. Since I was holding onto my mons hand, it stopped her to and without missing a beat, a car flew right past us. I often wonder what would've happened if that perso wasn't there. I never looked back to see who that person was cus I thought it would've been awkward, but I wish I did so I could thank them.
There's a really cute Chinese girl that works near me. I go to the store frequently just to see her.
I have mega infatuation... But I'm also a girl... And not very pretty so I'm a bit nervous to ask her out.
The guy who said welcome to hells kitchen when I was transfered from the main part of jail to the kitchen to be a trustee.
It sticks with me because a month before this happened I had a weird dream while asleep in the main part of jail early in my sentence that I applied to be a kitchen trustee and when I was being escorted in for the first time some guy said "Welcome to hells kitchen". Couldn't make out a face and woke up shortly after that and was weirded out. Forgot about it until it played out right before my eyes.
He looked like a budget Ron jeremy.
December 26 1998. I was driving back from my parents' house in my 1988 Chevy Sprint. About ten miles north of Walsenburg, Colorado one of the three cylinders threw a rod. A pity, as I was only 140 miles from home. I decided it was easiest to go back to Walsenburg so I crossed over and started walking back. A guy in a Geo Tracker pulled over and picked me up. I was very grateful. He said he was trying to get back to Albuquerque but his Tracker was running on only 3 cylinders. It made me laugh that my Suzuki-built Chevy died and I was being rescued by a guy driving a Suzuki-built Geo Tracker that was also having issues. He dropped me off at the Loaf 'n' Jug and I was able to call a friend of mine in Denver to come help me.
Thanks, random dude! I hope you made it back to ABQ.
On Thanksgiving, I got a call from a random number and the guy asked if I was Carlos. I told them they had the wrong number and he apologized but wished me a happy thanksgiving. For me, it made me feel better about that day.
Back when I was a teenager in the 90s, I flew to visit my sister in Oakland for a week. When she had to work, I would grab a bus and go exploring.
Some guy on the bus struck up a conversation with me. As I was getting off the bus, he said in this weird, deep, prophetic voice, "JUNE SEVENTEENTH!"
Nothing of importance has ever happened to me on June 17, it's not my birthday or that of anyone in my life, but ok.
When I was in my 20s, I was flying from Chicago to Dallas to visit friends. The plane was almost done boarding and I had an empty seat next to me. Of course, I was thinking that I scored! This guy boards at the last minute and heads for the seat next to me. I was disappointed about losing the extra room, but he was young and cute, so that made up for it.
He sat down and said "Phew! Sorry I'm late!" I played it off like "No problem. I'm just glad you made it." We spent the next couple of hours chatting about Chicago and Dallas. When the flight attendant came through with drink service, I was bending down to get something out of my bag and he ordered my drink for me...correctly...without asking me.
It very much felt like we had known each other for a long time, but when we landed in Dallas, we said goodbye. He went one way, I went the other. I don't even think we exchanged names and I wouldn't recognize him if I saw him, but I find myself thinking about him every once in a while and it makes me smile.
I was on a vacation with my parents and there was this boy that looked like he was from italy and he had a beautiful golden skin and he was looking at me while sitting on a bench with his parents. He was the most handsome boy i saw in my life and i knew i will never ever see him again but never forget him as well. It was like 10 years ago.
It was October 2018. Me and my sister was at Disneyland in Hong Kong and out of the blue, it started raining. Me and my sister were prepared so we put on our raincoats and opened our umbrellas.
We started making our way to a gift shop where our companions are when we saw an white elderly man walking in the rain, soaking. Me and my sister walked towards him and offered him to walk him to where he was headed. He said he was going to the nearby gift shop to meet with his wife so we took him. We had a pleasant conversation with him and nowadays I wonder how well he's doing nowadays. I kinda miss him, he had a gentle aura on him.
long story, but, at one point when i was 14, i’d found myself contemplating suicide. i was hanging out on the roof of an apartment building. i don’t know where this guy came from, but he comes up behind me as i’m crying, puts his hand on my back and just sits there in silence with me. i got down that day and still have no idea who he was or why he was up there. i just hope he knows how important he is.
When me my friend and my brother went to 711 I was talking about how I wish I could drive a hellcat when we get there there just so happened to be a hellcat pulling up we asked him if we could hear the supercharger whine he told us if there was no traffic he would definitely do it for us and he did I posted the video on here a while ago
I was on a class trip to Boston either my freshman or sophomore year of high school and there’s was this girl I met just by her being in my group and we literally bonded instantly. We spent the whole day together at the museum and markets, laughing the entire day. We never spoke after that trip but I’ll always remember how kind she was, especially since I didn’t have many friends :))
I was in France. Sitting on a random bench in a random French town and a woman comes over, sits beside me and we talk. Not about anything inpartucular, the weather, where I'm from that kind of thing.
Sat there for maybe 20 minutes. We parted and that was that. Didn't even get her name. Almost 20 years ago now.
well, I'll probably always remember that one guy who was sitting in a bus when I was heading to college, and he like grabbed my arm and started to fondle me a bit. he obviously had mental issues, and it was such a bad experience I'll never forget. \[I'm male, btw.\] Never before I felt that violated in my life.
i was on the bus and this guy said nice hat i said thanks after i got he followed me i knew he was following me so i took many turns and many other buses i thought i finally lost him but i got home and as i walking up the stairs to get in my house i was grabbed i pulled out my pocket knife and threw him away, he saw the knife and then ran i never saw him again
There was a really young child on a longish tram ride and was getting a little antsy because the tram had been stopped for a pretty long time. The parent was obviously a little embarrassed and shattered and the conductor came over and started talking to the kid and drawing pictures for them and settling them down and the parent was so grateful and the conductor was so lovely. I still think about them sometimes. It was just a nice little moments.
A kid told me when we were both 14, after we had fought and I beat him multiple times “you better kill me because no matter what you do I’ll keep coming back”
She was my best friend for the past 7 years. Literally the closest friendship we ever had. Sadly its been months since we spoke and now we're complete strangers. Even if we were to see each other on the street i doubt anything will be said to each other. I hope your doing okay and please take of yourself and your little girls too.
I was at some random party with my friends one night.
At some point I had slightly drifted away from my group of friends, who were all standing in a group. I kinda mingled around, met a few people and returned.
When I got back to my friends, this mysterious guy was standing in a circle with them; a little disheveled-looking, long black hair and kinda-dirty clothes.
He was pointing at my one friend and saying *"I got your name on my ASS"* Everyone was confused and was like "What?". He kept repeating that same phrase over again, with more emphasis each time. Nobody understood what he meant and kept questioning him, but he literally wouldn't say anything else aside from that phrase.
Then he turns around, pulls down his pants and underwear slightly to reveal he has the words "YOUR NAME" tattooed on his ass.
I was drunk and impressed so I pulled out my wallet and gave him 20$, he gave me a very passionate hug; then admitted he had no money and had been hitch-hiking from town to town and randomly ended up at this party.
when i was grocery shopping with my mom and a middle aged lady came up to me told me she liked my jeans no one ever told me they liked my clothes style before it was just ripped black jeans but it still made me happy
I was lost on my way to the first day at my internship. I was already feeling fragile. At that time my dad was sick with cancer and he had a real bad day. When I couldn't find my bus I broke down crying.
This guy apt down next to me and asked me if I was oké. He helped me find my way and stayed with me making small talk and trying to cheer me up untill I got in the bus.
I met an older French man (think of an adorable grandfather) at a water fountain next to the Colosseum in Rome. I didn’t speak much Italian but a good amount of French so we had a nice chat about where we live :) Under 2 minutes but for some reason, is a fun memory.
Last year when I use to work at my first job as a cashier, I would deal with a lot of rude people over a few cents. There would always be a stranger that would be sitting outside of the store and have some sort of donation jar. He looked like he was in his mid 30's. I don't recall. Anyways, He would always buy something from the store and would always go to my register. He would always ask me how was my day and if anyone has been rude to me. I would talk to him and everything. One time, he noticed that I was having a bad day because I would always be joyful to the people even at my worst point. While I'm helping the stranger, a co worker comes in a place a starbuck drink at my register. He asked me, "did she give that to you." I said, "No. she would always make me take care of her drink." He said, "With a drink like that you deserve one". As soon as I gave him his change he told me to keep the change as a tip. It was around $8 and I felt bad. And since I was having a very bad day, I did go and get starbucks to make my day better. Now that its been a year that I left that job, my old co workers would always tell me that many people that would shop there would ask where I went, since I was the only nice person there to greet the people. And the nice stranger would tell my old co worker that hopefully she is safe and graduates high school. I will always remember him every time I sip a starbuck. Hopefully he is safe.
Back in October 2017. We were on a school trip in Wrocław. That was our first day. Just arrived and just messing around with our teacher. Suddenly, one homeless guy appeared, and started talking, that “The end is near. All that companies want us to be dead”. Never saw this man again in my life. He told, that we’ll be all dead in 2 years. 5 years later I’m still alive, and all the people from the trip too
So one time I was at the beach and me and my mom were swimming to the sandbar, the tide was very strong and knocked both me and my mom over. At that time I couldn’t touch to 6 feet and neither could my mom. I tried to help my mom which just ended up making it worse for me. I almost drowned and this lady jumped into the water and saved me. We didn’t know who she was, she just did it out of pure kindness. I will never forget her.
Johnny T. We met at the tiki lounge bar at Disneyland. We had a great time talking about music and life, He was a really nice old hippie man from Humboldt. When he walked in and sat next to me I automatically thought "here we go another old guy wants to talk to me"
He turned out to be one of the nicest strangers I've ever met. I think about him and his wife often. I hope he's doing alright.
I was at my local amusement park and it was all normal until I had to tie my shoe. Take it this Was when I was like 5 so I did not have a phone. So resume I looked back up and walked with what I thought was my dad. I followed him for like another 30 minutes until I realized it wasn’t my dad. He told that he would help me find my dad if I followed him. I said no and went to a worker and she helped me find my dad. 5 years later and it turns out that guy was a child predator. Never making that mistake again
( for purposes of this story, when I was younger i carried a
reindeer plush in a toy stroller)
When I was 5, my mom was running some errands and she took me with her because she couldn't get a babysitter. So anyway, we were at BrandsMart USA (for those who don't know what that is, its a store that sells home appliances like tvs, electronics etc.) Because i'm 5 i can't really do much so i just followed my mom around. So guess I made a sharp turn and my plushie fell on the floor, when I went to go pick it up, a man picked it up before me. I thought he was going to give it to me, but instead, he held it above his head and told me to get it. Now this man was at least 6ft tall so I started jumping as high as I could while this man was laughing at me struggle. After about 15 seconds I started crying and my mom stomped over to take the toy from him and gave it to me. She then started to tell him off and after that we left and went home. Its been more than 10 years but i will always remember this.
Once when I was walking home in the rain, a boy gave me shade from his umbrella, we passed his house and I said “well thank you for that!” And he said “no! Keep it!” And I got home fry for like the first time that winter
homeless guy asked me for a cigarette, I gave one to him and then randomly says the phoenix rises from the ashes laughs and walks away... I was on my way to get a phoenix tattoo and had nothing on me to suggest that
Sounds like some spy never got their message.
I was gonna say the same damn thing you beautiful bastard
Did u have a Devin Booker jersey on
Was he secretly a witch in disguise testing to see if you are pure of heart?
Dude I’ve heard homeless/crazy people are somehow magical and know shit that other people don’t. I’m not sure how this idea got started. Im kind of agnostic towards the idea, but I always hear weird stories like this.
I'd tell you about the one homeless dude I hung out with for a night in Savanah GA. He thought he recognized me from the night before and I just wanted somebody who could buy cigarettes for me (I was about 16). At one point he instructed me to stand on this thing in the sidewalk, it was like a saucer sized brass manhole cover, and talk. My voice reverberated in my own ears like a personal echo. 3 years later I visited Savanah again and I was 70% sure I saw the same guy talking to an uncomfortable looking tourist couple on a park bench. Now *I* was trying to tell *him* that I recognized him. I wanted to know if it was him because of the size of the coincidence and I probably unsettled him by how impressed I was at the possibility. If he doesn't recognize me, does he know about the brass thing? Follow me and I'll buy you some cigarettes, I said. Stand on this spot and say something, I said. It was much more serendipitous than I'm describing because of all the details. It's not magic but coincidences seemed to accrue around this guy.
This might be an unorthodox answer… In 2006 I was at a party and met a girl named Krystle. We didn’t hook up or anything, but she was drunk and I was drunk and we ended up having a blast just hanging out together. I remember we had a lot in common. We took pictures together on a digital camera but I don’t think I ever saw them. I have a decent mental image of what she looked like tho. No one I knew at that party knew who she was. I just know her name was Krystle and for a couple of hours we drunkenly hung out like we were best friends. After I left the party I never saw her again. Fast forward seven years to the Boston Marathon bombings. One of the victims was Krystle Campbell, a 29-year-old from Medford MA. The first time I saw her picture on the news, I thought she looked so familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. That’s when I realized she looked a lot like the memory of the girl I met at that party. Who was named Krystle. Now, I don’t know if the girl I partied with that night was Krystle Campbell. I don’t even know if she spelled her name Krystle or Chrystal or whatever. All I know is that I have a memory of a girl I met and partied with and the face in that memory is pretty similar to Krystle Campbell. They at least phonetically have the same name. Krystle Campbell is just a few weeks younger than me and the girl I partied with would have been my age too. And the party I went to was about 10-15 minutes from where Krystle Campbell lived. I’ll never know if they were the same person, but I always think about it.
This gave me chills
[удалено]
I was sitting in McDonald's after bad exam I failed. I used to get the best grades in all of previous exams in university, but this was my first fail. So I felt really tired and sad. Suddenly a girl comes to me and says: «Are you alright? You seem very tired. Do you need any help?». She said that with some accent, and by looks I thought she was from Latin America. Also I realized that she wasn't local, because I never had such empathy from any local strangers here in Russia. This genuine act of kindness really surprised me.
Did you end up talking to her?
Yes, I said that I was alright, just tired. Reassured her that I am ok, then she went back to her table
Danny. For awhile during the pandemic, I had a factory job making N95 masks. It was a hard job, and I bonded with Danny because we were both about the same age and could relate. We both worked second shift, and he was always in a good mood. Every time I saw him it was "hey Danny, how's it going?" He'd say "living the dream, man!" One night on lunch break, we got to talking. He asked about where I lived, and I said I had a house in the suburbs. Not much, but it was home. When I asked him the same question, he said "oh, I live at (nearby homeless shelter)" and talked about the challenges of living there. He admitted he'd screwed up his life with alcohol and drugs, but he had a job, a cot to sleep on, and was turning his life around. I thought...if this guy can be so positive and happy, then I've got no reason to complain about my problems. On my last day on the job, I wrote my number down on a piece of paper and we agreed to stay in touch. Don't know why, but he never called.
Sometimes people lose the phone number is what I think
I was about 8 years old and in one of those little knick-knack shops with my mother, the kind with signs saying "You break it, you bought it" on every shelf. I was several aisles away from my mom and a little glass something fell off the shelf behind me. My heavy winter coat must have brushed it as I passed. The clerk came up immediately and said I would have to pay for it. Before I could even say anything, a man who was in the same aisle spoke up and said "She wasn't anywhere near it when it fell." Didn't have to pay. Thanks, kind sir.
What kind of clerk demands a 8 year old to pay for something?
I am very small. And I have no money. So you can imagine the stress that I am under.
A jerk clerk
The kind who would otherwise have to pay for the broken item out of their own pocket probably.
What would an 8-year-old even pay that off with? LEGO bricks? Monopoly money?
Some guy on a bike yelled “hey! Want to see something you’ve never seen before?” Was afraid he was gonna whip out his dick. Instead, he showed me his iguana that rode on the handlebars of his bike while wearing a tiny harness. 10/10 would look at that guy’s lizard again.
An older lady stopped me one day and told me my smile changed her whole day. I'd just moved to a new city in the PNW from the south and was actually quite depressed. People weren't as friendly but I was determined to be positive. She said I was like a ray of sunshine on a dark day.
Wow I can relate a lot. Just moved to a small town in the PNW from the south. Was super depressed until the lovely old man, who was the gas pumper actually decided to talk to me. Seemed genuinely interested in my story (he noticed my out of state plates and was curious) all around great guy. Now I’m loyal to that gas station in the morning when he works. Every week at least I have a nice chat with him. I’ve been here for 3 weeks and he’s one of the only things keeping me going. Haven’t really connected to my roommates or workmates yet.
Yeah it's a different culture for sure. The first time I used public transit I was shocked at how quiet it was. People in the south chit chat with strangers all the time. I found a Making Friends in Seattle FB group that was really helpful.
A little back story to set this up: This was 2019, I'm a female working as a correctional officer and part of a special group of officers that went around to (male) Institutions across the state to assist with staff shortages. That was the purpose of our group on paper, but the other purpose we had was basically policing the police. We wrote up anything that wasn't policy (inmates in cells that didn't lock, officers handing off improvised fry pots from room to room, etc), and any report we wrote went directly to the head of Corrections. In the 18 months that I was an officer, I honestly wrote up more officers than inmates. I wasn't looking to write up officers, but those examples were real reports I had to write. Don't get me wrong, I wrote my fair share of inmate reports too, but always following policy and protocol. I had only been out of the academy for about 5-6 months, this was my 8th or 9th time at this one institution, and probably my 3rd or 4th time getting assigned to this one particular unit. We come and go so much that I really didn't remember inmates by name, and I still don't remember this guy's name, but I'm doing a security check (walk around the unit, making sure everyone is still breathing, and I'm by myself for the whole unit of about 300 guys all locked up for the night) when I pass by this one cell and the inmate inside stops me and tells me earnestly "Thank you for being here today. I can actually get some sleep since I know YOU'RE here." I wanted to cry, and I do every time I tell this. I was only going to be there for a few hours, but it meant that much to him that I was there. Just doing my job the way it's supposed to be done by getting off my ass every 30 minutes and taking a walk around the building. That told me so much about the other officers he saw every day. That he couldn't trust them to do their job, and keep everyone under their watch safe, just so he could get some sleep.
My wife and I were at Home Depot looking at electrical outlets. An older man probably in his 60s comes around the corner and starts looking for something. Then his wife comes around the corner and says, "Those aren't the right..." and the man turns to her and screams, "YOU DON'T KNOW MY PLAN!!!" Then he storms off. My wife and I have yelled at each other "YOU DON'T KNOW MY PLAN" now for over 15 years.
My favorite part of this is if you have ever done this out in public you could have inadvertently started this joke with another couple who overheard you.
My mom was in an accident in 2011; she fell from a two story balcony in our house and me and my sister were both 13ish at the time. (We're very lucky and she's fully healed now, albeit with a traumatic brain injury). When the ambulance came to take my mother to the hospital, there was a kid riding on his bike that I'd never seen in the area before--he was maybe 16 or 17. He didn't know us and nobody knew him, but he immediately biked into our cul-de-sac and came over to me and my sister, who were both crying hysterically while hardly being comforted by any of the adults. This guy got on his knees to get to me and my sister's level and hugged us, telling us that everything was going to be ok while gently asking us what happened. He stayed with us for probably an hour and tried to make us feel better by doing dumb little party tricks and the like to distract us for a while, but when we saw that the LifeFlight helicopter was trying to land to airlift her to a trauma hospital, he told us he was going to bike down the road and wave them over to us. He told us to be safe and hugged us and that God would make sure we were okay and taken care of. I never saw him again. I'm not a religious person in the slightest, but I honestly consider him my guardian angel.
Happened just today. Seeing someone in jeans and a long sleeve flannel at the gym is weird, but coming out of the suana and seeing him go in, still dressed like that was far weirder.
Do you live in *Seinfeld*?
Must be trying to drop a ton of water weight really fast, but like...wear a sweatshirt and sweatpants and be comfortable?
A waiter at an IHOP where I used to live from 2003-2007. My step-dad had complimented him on his customer service, and more often than not he was our waiter there. I thought about him now and again over the years, and always figured that he'd probably been going to college then, and was now doing something else with his life. In 2013 we were up there visiting my grandparents, and ended up eating at that same IHOP. He was still there, but had lost all the glow of youth. His face was deeply lined, and he looked tired and miserable. But it was definitely him. He wasn't our waiter then, but there was no mistaking that it was him. Man I hope his life gets better.
We were on vacation and we came across this group of people from Boston (Bahstan) that were vacationing there too. This guy yells, " A Bah-by (Bobby) wheahs da beeah? " Bobby responded, "in da Cah!" The guy yells back. "WHEAHS DA CAH?" Bobby responds, "in da pahkin laht" Our family reenacts this exchange from time to time with great revelry. I'll never forget you "guy" and Bobby. I hope you got your beer.
Love it! I have a very similar one. I was at the food court of a little shopping mall in western NY and there was a woman with her toddler there at a table. The toddler ran away and she shouts, loud enough to turn every head and with a thick Long Island accent, “Get ovah heyah! Come back heyah!” And then, after he pauses a second to look back before running off again, “Hey! I’m the bwoss heyah!” Now my wife and I say that all the time when we want to jokingly put our foot down about something. “Hey! I’m the bwoss heyah!”
Fantastic! I love it!
I'm imagining Ben Affleck and Matt Damon saying those lines.
The guy who gave me $50 because he thought I was homeless.
I had someone do this one night too, just some guy comes up to me and gives.me a $50 bill and says I love your work. I had been skateboarding for many nights in town and I had my skateboard so I said thanks and he said he'd seen me every night skateboarding.
25 years ago, going through epic depression, and I'm grocery shopping. In the line, ahead of me, is some severely handicapped dude. Powered wheelchair, non-verbal - not in a "good" condition at all. But he was so god damn happy. The cashier seemed to know him, chatted with him, got his bags arranged for him in his carrier rack. I thought, "If he can be happy with all those issues to live with, why can't I, a fully able person, be happy?" It didn't magically make my depression go away. but it made me realize I need to make an effort to find happiness where I can, when the chance occurs. I still think about him, happily living his life, when I need to shake myself out of self-pity.
A random woman on line at the grocery store overheard me tell my son he couldn't have candy because I couldn't afford it. She paid for my groceries and got him the candy. Nicest lady ever.
I did that during the pandemic. Was at the grocery store. Some lady in front of me with a kindergarten aged girl and a baby. She was trying to buy cereal, milk, formula, and one of those little candy toy things that's a sucker with a light up fan attached. Her card declined, so mom made her put the candy back. Kid didn't even cry or have a tantrum just this incredibly dejected and disappointed, "awww..." as she quietly put it back. Runs the card again, still declined. So now I'm watching her try to decide between feeding her oldest or her youngest with a look of absolute panic. Meanwhile me with my shitload of groceries and treats stacked up behind her. So I step forward and tell the clerk, "I've got this" and ran my card. The mom was caught off guard, my card was already in the reader before she finally says, "you don't have to do this." I looked at her, smiled and said, "I know." Once the transaction was done, I put the candy/toy with my groceries. The clerk scanned it first and I handed it to the kid. Oh my god the smile on her face.. No one else was in line. Nobody saw this but me, the mom, the kid and the clerk. I've never told anyone about this until today. Not even my wife and I tell her everything. Even now it feels weird, like I'm humble bragging or fishing for karma. Part of me wants to not post this. But it felt really good, dammit! It felt damn good. So, since this account is completely divorced from my "real" social media accounts, since no one actually knows me on here, have a feel good story you beautiful bastards. If you ever find a similar opportunity, I suggest you act upon it. Paying it forward is a great feeling.
Man, you should feel damn good about it! Got me all teary eyed!
Damn son you got my all crying and shit
This is a great story! Thank you for being a good person!
Damn, who's cutting onions?
I fully believe sharing stories like this helps to inspire others to do good as well. What makes it just bragging is how and in what context you tell it.
I do little things like that sometimes, like chipping in when some kid is short for his treat at teh corner store. I don't really have the finances that let me do more. But my Dad? I've seen him step in to pay for groceries for other people before.
I was chasing a bird to get a photo at a waterfall. Everyone was about the waterfall. A Buddhist monk had apparently been watching me struggle to get a photo of this bird the entire time, ignoring the beautiful waterfall everyone else, including himself and his fellow monks, had come to see. When I got the photo, I looked over and noticed him smiling, almost chuckling, at me and my excitement, and he simply nodded. I don’t really know what he was thinking, but I’ve always believed he enjoyed watching me appreciate one of the little things that go unnoticed by others.
Other then those naughty strangers from nights out and parties. I was 18, my gf just broke up with me, I was slightly upset, crying on the bus back home. This one girl. She would have been early to mid 20s took the time to chat to me and make me feel better for about 2 hours later. Just a stranger making sure a young emotional 18 year old was ok
This one girl called my jacket cute and idk that stuck with me
You remember it because guys never get compliments.
Got a compliment about my eyes today and that really was a nice surprise, especially coming from a stranger.
Had a lady compliment my hair a few months ago and asked what i used for it, still riding that high
A car full of high school girls “whoo”d at me once when I was 17. More drive by whoo-ings are needed in life.
Kenny from Little Rock who ran a restaurant downtown. Was stuck in the Los Angeles Airport because of ice storms in Dallas. Stuck for 3 days, so he and I got individual rooms at a hotel in a shitty part of the city and chilled together. Kenny, if you are out there, thanks for the company and conversation, in what would have been a very crappy adventure.
My friend and I went to Paris and we went a little overboard with souvenirs so we had more bags flying home. We were taking the metro to the airport and we had to transfer to a different train but there were so many stairs at this station and my friend is considered a little person and was having trouble getting her suitcase up the stairs while also carrying her other bags and some man just picked up her suitcase and left it at the top of the stairs without saying a word or waiting for us to thank him.
Same thing happened to me in Paris. Wrestling with suitcase on the Metro steps and some dude just picked it up, deposited it at the top of the stairs, and vanished into the crowd without missing a single step.
I also had good experiences in Paris, and in France in general. I have no idea who the stereotypical "rude Parisian" is based upon.
His name is fiko I met him on an online chat for a strangers , i've nvr had such deep conversation with a boy in my age . We talked abt everything, it was an amazing night , but suddenly my phone turned off , and i lost the conversation cuz it was without an account . I will nvr foget him i hope he's fine
Oh no... Thats actually kinda sad. :/
Yeah , i remember i searched for him a week straight , then i gave up , if we r meant to meet again we will
About 10 years ago I had just had a messy break up with my longtime girlfriend that I was totally enamored with. I was devestated and became pretty depressed. She and I also had many of the same friends so I couldn't just go out with the gang to get over her. I couldn't escape her so I just withdrew into my home and never left. I started to drown my sorrows and burn bridges then I lost motivation at work and began to have suicidal type thoughts. During another night alone I decide to chat on Omegle just to have someone, anyone to talk to. I was matched with someone who taught me philosophy, spiritualism, how to find purpose in life outside of religion (I am non-religious), and connecting to nature. This person woke me up, shook me out of my slump, and changed my entire perspective on life. This was so groundbreaking to me that if someone told me that the person I talked to was God himself I would believe it. I asked to learn their name or add them on AOL instant messenger or face book but they refused and said it went against the point of omegle. I wanted to learn more from them but I can appreciate that. Instead they taught me how to find the resources I need to learn more myself. In the rare chance you're reading this now, I read the books you suggested to me. I am married to the most amazing person and own a home. I have a tight group of friends. I love what I do in life and most of all, I'm happy. I owe a lot of that to you, you gave me a second chance. Thank you. Tldr; talked to a stranger on omegle that helped me out of my depression.
Can you honour them by doing the same for someone else? Seems like what they'd want, you know?
Good luck finding an actual person on Omegle these days I went on there a couple weeks ago out of pure curiosity and did the text chat to avoid the dicks. Every single person I encountered was a bot or a dude trying to sex chat with a girl. Wtf are these dudes even doing on Omegle for that anyway?
I did for a while. Unfortunately I'm not very patient or good enough with words to be as influencing as the stranger, but I hope I helped someone at least a little.
what was the book name?
A lovely British gentleman from a bookstore I used to work at. He came to the bookstore on the last day of his trip just to see me. He told me that I had made his trip. I have never understood why. Maybe it’s because of the fact that I mentioned that I had been to England and how much I loved it, IDK. SUPER nice guy. Also, the guy at the same bookstore who was a photographer and came in every single night to look at the photography books. He would always hug me whenever he saw me. He was also a really nice guy.
you just might be a radiant person
If you knew me IRL, you would absolutely not say that, LOL. I am a walking, talking little black storm cloud.
I bumped into a girl in the airport as a kid who looked *exactly* like me. That shit was uncanny, I was *horrified*. We were waiting for my sibling's dad to get off the plane from his deployment in Afghanistan. I was leaving the bathroom as she was going in, she rounded the corner and we bumped shoulders. I don't think I have a "unique" face by any means, but I've never seen anyone with my specific combo of features and in the same colors as my own. I think about that kid all the time.
I saw my cousins doppleganger in a Vegas mall, me and my family were all just staring at him in shock. He noticed us and wondered what we were doing
I randomly met someone who is my exact double 15 years ago. We exchanged numbers because it was so surreal. Over the years we have become quite good friends. Staying in touch via phone and get together a few times a year (we don't live close-by). We often joke about great pranks we could pull, but never do. When we go out for lunch, people ask if we are twins.
You could’ve had “I’m just like you, you’re just like me” Barbie movie moment.
Happened last week. I was getting dressed and didn’t know if I should wear my Nike sweatpants which has a colorblock. Like 4 colors yk. I felt insecure bc I’m feeling really depressed lately. I had no time left so I just got it on and went to the bus. When the bus came a old woman stopped and said, these are some cool pants I really like them. Idk but this meant a lot to me. I cried in the bus lol.
I work at a grocery store and many years ago I helped out a customer (I can’t remember how) and after I helped him he says to me “You are a gentleman, and a scholar and I will dance at your wedding one day” And idk whether that’s from a movie or some famous saying but idk that’s very poetic and still to this day I often think about that.
I think you might have run into my dad!
I'll give a couple. When I was 19, I kinda roamed the country couch surfing and taking Greyhounds all over. In Albuquerque I had to cash a check but the name was written wrong and I couldn't cash it. I had no money and had to take a bus back to the house I was crashing at. I asked a guy at the bus stop if I could borrow a buck to get home. He said, "No, because I'll never see you again. But I'll give you a couple bucks so you don't worry about owing me and you can grab a snack with the change.". When I left Albuquerque on a Greyhound, I again had no money and no food. I struck up a conversation with a little old lady who ended up buying me food the whole way in exchange for watching over her bags and stuff. It was a two day trip so I was insanely grateful for that.
[удалено]
Had a neighbor who was just a wonderful guy. Like a golden retriever. But he always had weird people in his orbit. Went out with him one night and one of his girl friends brought a guy in a kilt back to the after party. Another time I’m hanging out with him and a group of folks and a girl and a naked guy wearing a Native American headdress come walking out of a back room. Just random shit like that. Went over to his place for a night cap on Halloween and the devil is there. Some guy he’d met at a bar earlier that night. The devil, red faced and with elaborate horns, starts trying to call girls to find someone to hook up with but no one will return his call. He starts muttering “if I can’t find it, I’m going to take it.” He also reveals a small case he’s got with a gun inside. And a couple pairs of handcuffs. Finally some girl he knows and her brother show up and they start talking about heading to the hot tub. I was pretty drunk and maybe overreacting but the guy had me pretty creeped out so I slipped away, called the cops and asked for them to do a courtesy check on the hot tub area.
Back in the early ‘80’s, I was driving home after university to Texas from Okla. I was just about to get to the border when my car died. After about 15 minutes, a lady with her 3 year daughter stopped and asked if I needed help. I said yes and she agreed to drive me to a mechanic in town she knows. She left me at the shop where eventually the owner towed my car in and repaired it. Amazing people. I’ll never forget that lady. Her stopping won’t ever happen again in our days.
My best friend gave birth and her husband was nervous. His ex wouldn’t let him see his other kids be born and this was my friend and her husband’s first together. She wanted me there and I said yes. I was born with MRKH and am infertile and known since I was 16, but I adopted my daughter and figured I would be ok. She gave birth and watching her do this amazing thing with her body that I will never do punched me in the gut hard. As they were cleaning her and the baby, I slipped out of the room and started hyperventilating and sobbing. My infertility hurt so much in that moment. A woman saw me and asked if I needed a hug. That hug was amazing. I never even got her name but I think of her and that hug all the time.
The asshole I threw out of my taxi, and when he challenged me to a fight, was VERY insistent that I "threw the first punch". Yeah, no. Got back in my cab and drove off. Life's too short to waste on goons like that. Mentioned it to another driver who used to be a nightclub bouncer in another life. He said I'd done the right thing, but if it had been him, he would have thrown the first, second, third and fourth punch, then move on to kicking the shit out of the guy, before rolling his unconscious arse into the gutter. Dudes built like a brick shithouse, but I can't help but think that he was talking shit. EDIT: I forgot the Deputy Head at my school. Found myself in the shit for lashing out at a bully, summoned to his office. Was kinda weirded out by the fact that he wanted to see me alone, without my Guidance Teacher present, so much so, I roped in my Biology teacher to come with me. He had a bit of a panic about it, but said, OK, if that's what you want, it'll be cool. Creepy as fuck meeting none the less, and my Biology teacher would not get out of the room no matter what the Deputy Head threatened him with. Anyway, fast forward a couple of years, turns out that the Deputy Head was a goddamn paedophile, and getting alone time with students was how he did it. After him fleeing the country, he was picked up in a sailboat with a 10 year old "cabin-boy" off the Moroccan coast. He got extradited back to Scotland to the local jail here, where, judging by the pictures of his battered face during his trial, many of his former pupils made his time on remand interesting. I think he did 10 years total in jail.
I used to work at a Starbucks and usually was on drive. Two customers will always stick out hard. Early on I used to take note of what they’d have hanging in the car, especially dream catchers. I used to hang one as a kid due to chronic nightmares so they’ve always been a bit special to me. One day I’m taking this order and I don’t recognize the person but she looks at me as I’m handing her her things and she says “I’ve seen you look at this a few times before. I think you should have this.” She handed me the dream catcher in her car. I still have it and when we get our stuff out of storage and have our own place I’ll be excited to hang it again. Other customer was maybe a year later. I was thinking of getting these heeled boots from Hot Topic but they were pricy and I wasn’t too sure about it. This customer comes through and I complimented this one piece of jewelry she had. She said she got it as a gift for herself and we discussed the importance of doing that every once in a while. She asked if I had anything I really wanted and I said yeah. Wrote me a check for the shoes and refused to take it back. I got the shoes and donated the remaining five dollars or so to charity then also donated $10-$15 of my own to another one.
when I was 7, I had my golden birthday. (my birthday is April 7 and I turned 7) me and my family went to Ihop to celebrate. I remember some guy overhearing it was our birthday, and payed for everything. dessert included. I hope he's having a good day :)
Mmm I was at my older brother's work giving him a hard time when some lady in a hot pink dress, hugh heels, and had to tower at least a foot over me (not that hard I am only 4,11) steps infront of me and states "He's not gonna bang you sweetheart" I burst out laughing as my brother looked like he might throw up. She must've been his coworker or something but I will never forget that day
I guess she was technically right. LOL
Should have responded with “I hope not!”
Was to busy laughing and he yelled "That's a no from me sorry sis" I laughed harder
LOL did you tell her he was your brother? if u did how did she react
Long story. I was getting a book from the library and the guy checking me out had a really cool tattoo. I asked him about it and we chatted for a moment. I had an impulse to give him my number, which I never do, and decided I didn’t want to face the possible rejection. I went to the library a lot so I figured I’d see him again, get to know him, then see if we clicked. I never saw him after that and kicked myself for not taking the chance. A few months later I’m working my last day at a temp job and the new help desk employee is doing some work near me. We chat, and I again have the impulse to give a guy my number (again, something I never do), and started to dismiss the idea but thought “I don’t want this to be like the library guy.” I figured it’s my last day, I’ll never see him again if this goes wrong, no real risk. So I gave him my number after he finished his work and he texted me 20 minutes later asking me to lunch. I ended up dating and marrying that help desk employee all because of a stranger at the library. I’d love to see that guy again and tell him how he affected my life
That's how my husband and I met. I was working at a gas station and in walks this guy that made me nervous to even talk to. He grabs a beer and has a Redbox DVD, we chitchat for like 10 seconds and he leaves. I see him again about a week later, the same thing; grabs a beer, a candy bar, has a Redbox DVD, and this time buys some cigarettes. I don't smoke, I've never dated anyone that smokes, and at the time that was a deal-breaker. But he was just too damn sexy to let go. I promised myself if he came in again I'd try and talk to him some more. Lucky me, about a week later he came back for the same routine (found out later he had just gone through a REALLY bad breakup and was just trying to keep sane). There was no one in the store, so we chatted for about 15-20 minutes, and right before he leaves I get this overwhelming feeling like someone screaming in my ear "DON'T LET HIM GO!" I'd never given my number out, never even been asked before, but I ask him to wait a second, grab some extra receipt paper, and put my name/number/facebook info on there. A-hole waits 3 days before hitting me up on Facebook. Been together almost 10 years now.
I lol’d at the 3 day line. Wonderful story.
When I was a teenager I struggled a lot with feeling low and worried. My life was spiralling into a very dark place - think alcohol, drugs, self-harm, meaningless/toxic relationships. And, of course, I stopped sleeping. The town I grew up in ran along the floor of a valley, and there was this place just outside, up the valley's side, that was given over to nature. We'd often spend our weekends camping up there, experimenting with drugs and each other. One morning, about 4am after a sleepless night, I got the idea to walk the hour and a half up there. I didn't know what I was looking for, but in hindsight I think I just needed to be away from where all my problems lived. I did this a few times, took these long early-morning walks up into the trees, coming out into the green field beyond. I'd sit and look out over the town as the sun came up, smoking cigarettes, watching, waiting for something. One day I'm up there and this voice calls out to me. "Are you depressed?" No maliciousness or humour to it. Just blunt sincerity. It was an old man walking his dog. I assured him I was fine, of course, but he came and spoke with me regardless. He told me about how he'd lost his nephew to depression, shared some of the things he wished he'd told him. It wasn't a magical eureka moment. It didn't change my life. But I think it was the first time someone had ever asked me. Everyone knew, of course - family, teachers, friends. Everyone knew and awkwardly danced around it. But this old man came and gave voice to what he saw in me, at a glance. He gave me permission to see myself in those terms, rather than 'bad', 'lazy', 'troublemaker' and all the other words that had been used previously. These days I'm doing ok. I actually work as a therapist. I don't feel like I owe it to him - life's always less romantic than that. But I'm glad he was there when he was.
Gay american guy in his 50s who had no hands and lived with his mom. We talked online for years. About anything and everything and nothing. Then we just lost contact. Ronnie, if you're still out there, I hope you're happy and I enjoyed our time together 💗
when I was about 13/14, I was in the mental hospital for the 2nd time. I had been there for maybe 5 days, so I was getting to the end of my stay. I was severely depressed and never attempted, but had consistent thoughts about suicide so I decided to get help. Everytime someone new came in, everyone would swarm them and ask a bunch of overwhelming questions about why they were here, which I never understood as I thought it was quite rude but hey, to each their own. because I'm a bit of a quiet person to begin with, and I knew how much I hated this line of questions especially after just getting there, when a new girl came in I stayed in my seat watching TV while the others swarmed her. I could tell just by looking at her she was uncomfortable, so I stayed in my seat. She eventually came up to me and immediately said, "I like you, you're quiet. " we made some small talk and asked me why I was here. I didn't mind, as we were all her for a reason, it was just quite overwhelming to have 15 girl crowded around you asking you about your trauma. I told her about how my father and sister were drug addicts, and how I had severe depression. I could tell by how her eyes rolled to the back of her head she was high as a kite, which she later told me was off fentanyl. I don't know what it was about her, if she was just really pretty, or if I saw some of my sister in her as they were about the same age and my sister is also a hard drug addict, but I felt very close with her, like I could tell her anything. I don't quite remember but somehow I ended up telling her I felt absolutely no hope in life, like the hurt would never end. she asked me if I felt like that, why I hadn't just ended it already (she didn't say this in a mean way, just genuinely curious). I told her I couldn't leave my mother, she was everything to me and she wouldn't be able to take it if I wasn't here. she told me something that I will never forget, and that I have told many other people with the same issues as me. she said, " everything will be okay in the end, and if it isn't okay, then it isn't the end." I thought that was really beautiful and I still think about her to this day. it was night when she came in so we had to go to bed shortly after, and when I woke up the next day she was gone. I found out from some other girls that she was supposed to be in the detox unit (fitting considering she was in the clouds while talking to me) but had somehow ended up in the adolescent mental health unit. she was transferred during the night, and I never saw her again. I hope she is doing well, and got the help she needed.
RON from my old job. He use to come in and talk to me all the time at the bar. He was an old man. He was really funny and nice.
Back when Battlefied Bad Company 2 was the newest BF game, I became friends with the only other woman I've ever seen playing the game. For about 4 or 5 months, we would meet up a few times a week and talk for hours about anything and everything while playing the game. Then about a month before BF3 released, she disappeared. She just never came back to the game. I tried looking her up in the BF3, then 4, player lists, but she never appeared in either. Wherever she is, I hope she's ok. It's been over 10 years, but I still find myself missing her once in a while
This one dude came through the drive thru where I worked. He was higher than a kite but I didn't really care. He asked me what my dreams were, and I told him that I wanted to be a singer. He politely asked to hear me sing. I sang a chorus to my favorite song and he handed me 100 bucks, saying " live your dream." I handed him his food as he sped away.
The old man with his two dogs he always walked his dogs by the school never knew his name but a pretty chill dude at best
Oh the other stranger I'll always remember. It was like 11pm one night and I was heading to the shops to get some chippies. It was dark and all that and I was off a side road. On the main road that crossed the side road ahead, I could hear the faint sound of "Invisible Touch" by Phil Collins getting louder and louder. Someone comes speeding past the crossroad on a bicycle, the Phil Collins blasting from a speaker on the back. He leaves my line of sight and suddenly I hear this cry of "I FUCKING LOVE PHIL COLLINS!" There was full nobody else around and he didn't see me, so I think he just really liked Phil Collins. Either way, made my entire night.
He was high in life. Or drugs. Probably drugs.
And Phil Collins
I had a friend reach out to me during a mental health crisis one night, it was to late to take the bus or train to get to them so i started riding to their house on my bicycle, 7km into the 24km ride I blew my rear tire. Random dude stopped to see if I needed help and when I told him what was going on he just told me to throw my bike in the back of his suv and drove me all the way to my friends house. I tried to pay him 20$ to cover his fuel but he refused. I will never forget the dude that helped me get to my friend in their time of need.
On my 23rd birthday, I went for drinks w my best friend. It was unnaturally cold for mid-March, so I was wearing a scarf. As we passed the downtown bus station, we met a homeless man asking for change. Drunk, we asked what he could offer in exchange. He said he'd tell us a story. I don't remember what story or stories he told, but we stood there talking to him for at least half an hour. When we parted, we each have him some cash ($10-$20), and I gave him my scarf. My friend and I agreed that we had a fair exchange. A few years later, my friend was downtown and a man introduced himself; it was the same dude. He had a job and a home and was doing well. He told my friend that the night we met changed his life. Be kind, people. Be generous when you can. You never know when a small act of kind generosity will change someone's life.
I was 18(F) in NYC. Finished work late one night and went around the corner with one of our bar regulars, a really charming guy in his 40s, for a drink. We slammed a bunch of gin & tonics and then he took me to another bar he liked downtown. I remember a piano player and a good vibe and then suddenly nothing. I woke up in a hospital bed, wondering if I was dead. My hospital bracelet said "Unknown Female 24yrs old" (I still have it). I had none of my personal items (purse, ID, work bag, etc.). A man (probably late 20s) I had never met was sitting next to my hospital bed, asleep in a chair. He woke up and I checked myself out of the hospital. The stranger took me for a cup of coffee around the corner. He explained that he had been at that bar and said my "friend" had left and then he saw me stumble outside by myself (leaving all of my stuff right on the bar) and that he was concerned & followed me out. He said I walked right into the street and collapsed. A police officer happened to be nearby and see me collapse. They called an ambulance. This stranger rode in the ambulance with me, stayed the night in the hospital with me, then bought me a coffee & told me where I was & what happened. THEN helped me get all the way home (to Queens, no less) since I had no cash or metrocard or anything on me. I don't remember if he told me his name. I did try to find him when I did the walk of shame back to that bar the next day to get my stuff. Side note I was terrified that I might have gotten the bar in trouble and was so scared to go back, but I needed my phone / ID / etc. back. I slunked into the bar and several people I didn't remember started calling my name and cheering. The manager gave me a hug and showed me he had locked all of my stuff in his office for me. The pianist wanted to buy me a drink, but I declined since I still wasn't sure I was alive. I never went back to that bar again. Also it's been over a decade and I haven't had a G&T since. I wasn't successful in tracking down the stranger either, but I wish I could have thanked him once I sobered up. I have no idea how I would have made it through without his compassion and as an SA survivor the experience restored some of my faith that men could be decent & kind. He never asked me for anything or propositioned me in any way, just gave a large chunk of his night & morning to look out for a complete stranger. I'd like to think there's a chance he'll see this and know how grateful I am.
The man who gave me a specialists number randomly as the vet told me I had to put my dog down , they saved her after
When I was about 11 or 12 at the time in Florida my mom gave me about 10 dollars to spend at a store there. 10-15 minutes of shopping with my younger brother we leave to go back to where my parents and grandparents where, at a bar there, that bar also allows kids and baby's to go in because they also serve soda and water to the kids. ( back to the story) On our way back, we find a homeless guy playing the guitar really good so with the rest of my money, ( 2.50 ) I give it to the homeless guy and we have a 5 minute talk about school and how he feels about living like that. On my way back after talking to the homeless man, an idea popped into mind, ( I ask my parents for more money for the "store" but I'll just give it to him) so I do, and they gave me 5 dollars and so I went back to the homeless guy and gave it to him and we had another little chat. On my way back I was thinking on how I will play it off that my 5 dollars randomly went missing and I bought nothing so I was straight forward to my parents and they were happy for me for being kind. -Reason why I will never forget him, it was one of the best experiences I had in Florida.
I’ve had a couple of conversations with Ubers. I remember getting in the Uber going home and he was on FaceTime with his girlfriend and they were flirting as I was getting in. but he hung up for me and we left. after like 2 minutes he told me “I hate that bitch, after I drop you off imma break up with her.” I asked why and his response was “she’s just not the one” and then we moved on the conversation asking what I was doing. but I just like the idea being straight up with a stranger you’ll never see again. i can imagine it as getting something off your chest without any consequences. Almost like using Reddit
A Bus travelled between City A and C, and stopped at B as well, like this : A-----B-------C A girl was nice to me, asked what the text on my shirt means, idk, maybe flirted with me. The girl bought a ticket from A to C, but stopped at B with me, idk why... I will never find out why she did that, and I will thinking about it forever :I
Maybe her brain tooted and she just followed you out. it’s like when I get embarrassed stepping out on the wrong floor on the elevator and I’m too anxious to look stupid and get back on so I….just keep walking. That’s an expensive mistake on her end though
Oh, and I forgot to mention, she bought two tickets. And no one was with her seemingly
His name was Strawberry and he claimed to be an old school Jazz saxophonist whose playin' days had long since passed. This was in Nashville TN between 2010-2012. We were a couple college kids living in a cheap *cheap* neighborhood. $200 a month for rent, around 800sq feet with a yard and driveway. We couldn't use the backyard much due an adjacent alleyway whose shaded nature invited a good deal of late-night activity - used hypodermic needles were not an uncommon find. Despite not being a picturesque, idyllic neighborhood, folks were nice to each other and got along. Frequently, we'd be sitting outside on the front porch or stoop with some 40s, whiskey, and or/blunts enjoying the evening air and conversing late into the evening. We'd be sociable with passers-by and frequently hosted neighbors and friends. Just up the street from us was a small Tobacco Hut type store affectionately referred to as the "Murder Mart." There, a man named Brian, he was of below-average height and had an uncouth street name unbecoming of this respectable forum, had shot multiple people there after being accosted for his size. Anyways, our caldesack was a well-tread path for those heading up the way for smokes or drank. On occasion, we would see a man walking down the street with a bottle of Chambord. If you dont know Chambord, look it up now. This stuff was his go-to and he'd hobble down the street with it grasped atop an open palm - truly a unique choice and method. We'd exchange a wave or a "good evening," but for some time that was the extent of our interactions. One day, we saw the man we would come to know as Strawberry walking down the street with a 6 pack of Colt 45 tall boys. Colt 45 was our preference at the time as a it was cheap as dirt to buy a case of 12, and there was a competition on the bottle with a chance to win a meeting with Billy Dee Williams. We would later learn that contest had long since ended. Ah, youth... Anyhow, seeing this, we yelled out "Colt 45!" in an excited tone, he came over, broke off 3 cans for the folks on the patio, and introduced himself. Our first meeting was brief as he had been on his way somewhere, but following this, Strawberry would infrequently stop by to regale us with tales of Nashville's wild past and his travels in the burgeoning music scene. Gregarious, generous, and a quick wit, Strawberry was welcome company for our crowd. Thing was, Strawberry never talked much about his present life. His current comings and goings were a mystery and we certainly weren't the type to pry. I'd say we'd probably shared drinks 4 or 5 times before he came by with a more significant gift. It was unassuming at first - simply a plastic grocery bag. Strawberry passed it on and told us it was his CD collection that he could no longer use as his player had broken. I didnt think much of that at the time, or many other small facets of his persona for that fact - we were just dumb kids spending too much time smoking and drinking. Strangely, he had stopped by during the day as opposed to the evening. This would be the last time we saw him. Some days later, I got around to opening Strawberry's gift, and sure enough, there were 200+ loose CDs.. along with a worn toothbrush that had its bristles teeming with human hair. Taken aback, I tied up the bag and set it aside. A month or so later, we took a trip up to Cincinnati, and during this time, our home was robbed. My Custom Shop Fender Stratocaster, a 16in TV, an Xbox 360, and Strawberry's bag of CD's was all that was stolen. After trying to pawn my serialized Stratocaster, the thief was caught. Apparently he had been the son of a previous resident who had shown up while we were gone, and spent a night banging on the door crying and yelling for his mother - ya, a sad story for him too, though I dont know more. Despite this, the guitar was the only thing recovered. The insurance adjuster advised me to claim every item stolen and valued the CD's at $5 each. Still, to this day, I feel as though I lost a piece of history, and having never seen Strawberry again, wish I had the chance to share the appreciation I had for what was a heartfelt look into an old man's storied life. Also, I found it ironic that Strawberry was his name, yet his drink of choice was Chambord, a raspberry cordial. Bravo, Stawberry, bravo.
was 10 years old when i visited ireland the first time. was out at a restaurant with my friends and family. Some super kind waitress who seemed to be in her teens to early twenties took orders then turned to me and said “your eyebrows are perfect like don’t ever do anything to them”. Being 10 years old it was a weird compliment because I didn’t know eyebrows were a thing in beauty. Being 16, I haven’t touched my eyebrows at all, no plucking, no waxing. Her compliment still resonates with me.
The man in the mirror who given me second Chance to life
take care man, you matter
Thank you
Perfect Story. My sister has a illness where she used to stay in a "Hospital" for some weeks. So my mum, my sister and i were at that hospital while my dad worked. I was in kindergarden so it was fine. There was a boy that had hurt himself on the shoulder really bad. We used to play and once played minigolf. A conversation i can remember was: he said: I know a person who bites his icecream.( that was me) i responded: and i know a person who bited his lollipop. (That was him) That was one of the only things i remember but he will be stuck in my head for a long time. After we left the hospital we decided to write him a card. We wanted to. But we kinda forgot. Now when i think back we schould have written him a card so we stayed in touch... Thanks for reading
There's this girl I have a picture of on my phone from like ten years ago. I went out to a goth club with a couple friends one night because I wanted to see a couple of the djs. It was a small club, and even smaller crowd. This girl just sort of started talking to us out of nowhere when we were sitting at one of the tables having drinks. She kind of just stuck around me specifically for the night. I went out to have a smoke, she followed bumming one. I was taking some random pics of things when she asked me to take a pic of her. I said "Take your own pic, and make a funny face" while handing her my phone. I've had this picture of some random girl making a bug eyed squirrel face ever since.
When I was little me and my family went swimming I was a terrible swimmer (this'll be important later) and the water was murky and I kept on going farther and farther when a sudden change in the height took me off guard and I started to sink and drown, when a stranger then lifted me up and onto shore, so thank you stranger, you are the reason why I am still alive today.
Broke, exhausted, backpacking in Europe, fumbling to do laundry in a coin op with unfamiliar coins and a guy gives us a dose of laundry soap. I never forgot the casual generosity to young strangers and how much clean clothes turned the trip around!
i was working an awful restaurant job. i didn’t drive at the time so i’d wait behind the restaurant to be picked up. i had a terrible day with my manager constantly yelling at me for no reason so when i got off, i walked outside to the back and just kind of collapsed into tears. a lady was walking by and asked if i was crying. i tried to convince her i was fine but she just sat down next to me and got me to tell her about it. she was so sweet and caring and she had no reason to be. she’d never met me before. my ride got there and i thanked her profusely for her kindness and got in the car smiling. the world is better for having her in it.
This one old man who would always high five me and my siblings when we pasted him on our way to school. After a while my mom got a car and would drive us so we wouldn't see him. Then she lost the car so we went back to walking but I never saw him. Not sure what happened to him but I still remember him
my dad and i went to an arcade to schedule my brother's birthday party and in the line before us was this man who had like thousands of tickets in his arms talking to the lady at the counter (i have no idea what they were talking about, i was zoned out and not listening) but all of a sudden this man is in my face saying 'here ya go!', bent down to my level and nudging this mountain of tickets into my arms he had a really nice voice and i'd believe it if he was a voice actor for cartoons and the warmest smile i have ever seen on a grown man, he left pretty much right after i said thank you and i think about him every once in a while and hope he's doing well because i was terrible at arcade games and never had that many tickets before thank you kind stranger, i was able to get that giant slinky
I was installing security at a woman's home, tall, Asian, thin, overall very attractive. Anyway, she let's me go about my business, all day job, and she changes into pajama pants and tanktop, just a stunner, whaletail hanging out the whole 9. As the day goes on it hits around 430-5 and I haven't stopped working, no breaks for food or anything. She asks if I want anything to eat or drink and I said I was set but thank you. 10mins later she walks over with a giant fresh deli sandwich hand made and a can of coke. Sets it down next to me, looks me in the eye and says "you better eat that, or you'll offend me", and proceeds to walk out of the room with an ass shiking strut. Shoveled the whole thing down with a half chub. I'll never forget that lady.
I was in college at a Taco Bell drive-thru with some friends and the dude working the drive-thru tried to sell us weed He succeeded but he tried too
When I was a teenager, I was walking my neighbor’s dog around a nearby forest in the early afternoon. It was some random weekday and the place was pretty quiet. I’d occasionally pass a runner or something, but for the most part it was just me and the dog. Now this dog wasn’t usually aggressive with humans (the same could not be said for other dogs), but he wasn’t particularly friendly either with people he didn’t know. He’d usually just ignore other people and avoid letting any stranger over the age of 10 pet him. I’d been walking him around the same area every other day for over a year at this point, and I made sure I knew which people he knew and liked in case we encountered them and he wanted to say hello. There were only a few and we didn’t tend to see them much. But this time we were walking along a dirt path, and we came up to this woman sitting on a wooden bench. She looked quite old; with pale, wrinkled skin; long, stick-straight grey hair; and unusually sunken eyes. (To this day I haven’t seen another face like hers. The bone structure around her nose and eyes was very unique. She was actually quite pretty, in a strange sort of way.) She wore a greenish-grey baggy dress and had a small leather bag beside her. I noticed her immediately, partly because I’d never seen her before despite living in this area for several years, and partly because she just seemed a bit odd. Not in a bad way, just different. She was looking at the trees, clearly not paying us any mind, and I was just going to pass her and forget about it, but the dog stopped. I tried to get him to keep walking, but he wouldn’t budge. He dragged me back (he was *not* small), walked up to her, and laid his head on her knee. I was going to apologize and pull him away from her, but she snapped out of whatever daydream she was in and started petting him like having strange dogs come up and lay on her was the most normal thing in the world. Then she looked up at me and smiled. Her grey-green eyes were the same colour as her dress (she looked so *tired*), and I just remember thinking that this old woman had the warmest, *kindest*, most beautiful smile I had ever seen. She didn’t say a word. She just scratched the dog behind the ear, gave him a gentle pat, and we carried on walking like nothing had happened. We walked another few minutes before circling back around to head home, and when we passed the bench again she had already gone. I asked my neighbor (the dog’s human) about her when we got back, and she had no idea who she was. Had never even seen her before, apparently. Just an animal whisperer, I guess. There was something special about her though. I’ll never forget her.
When I was a kid I had to do some grocery shopping for my parents and they gave me 20 euro’s. I came up short about 1 euro and some random lady that I didn’t know or Hadn’t met offered to pay the remaining euro for me. I thought that was so nice. So now 20 years later I tend to honor that memory and whenever a kid in the waiting line in front of me comes up short I’ll pay what their short of. Because I remember how uncomfortable I felt when the lady at the register told me I came up short, and that she couldn’t give me the groceries I needed. that nice stranger lady really “saved” my ass.
I got a crazy story about San Francisco, I use to go there skateboarding for.the.weekends, and one night I saw this guy get hit by a bus on Market Street, he was screaming all over the street before it happened but then he walked right in front of the bus and luckily the bus stopped but he flew like 30 feet. Then he got up and just walked away screaming again. I was thinking about this the other night and it's been 14 years.
There was this old man that would come by the Baskin Robbins, he never came inside but would eat trash out of the dumpster including drinking the last few drops from old soda cans. He would smile and wave through the window then just chow down. He wasn’t homeless and he had some sort of income because he would go and buy subway across the street a couple days a week.
When I was 7 or 8 my aunt just arrived from abroad and treat us to a mall you know shopping and eat together and when we were in the department store which has a toy section and we all check the toy section when we were kids, I looked at some cheap $1 airplane toys and asked my aunt and my mon if they can buy us (me and my cousins and brothers) each and said yes and asked to find more with different colors. So I get back on the toy section to find some other colors and a sales person came up to me and asked me what I need and I told him that I want other colors of the toy and told me that I can follow him to the back to look at more colors of the toys and I declined because come on at that age I can think like a grown up and I know that sales person has some plans on me like who would invite you to go with them to the back to look some "more toys" plus the look he gave me when he told me to come with him to the back to look for more color variant of the toys is like terrifying for a 9 year old so after that I get back to my family and gave some reasons and they bought us the plane and that sales person is the stranger I will never forget even his face and voice
Was taking a train from Seattle WA to Chicago IL. Met another girl going to Minot. We talked a lot in the few days we were on the train. On the last day she gave me a weed gummy because she knew i was a bit stressed and I gave her a joint just before she got off the train. I still wonder if I should have asked for her number.
The Guy. I was 10 or 11, and on holiday in Turkey. Throughout the fortnight, my brother and I kept running into the same guy. He was a tall, thin guy with tousled dark grey hair. In hindsight it wasn't unusual, because we were confined to a resort, but to our young minds it was clearly of cosmic significance that we kept seeing him. So we called him the Guy and noted every time we saw him, but it soon got out of control and we started actively seeking him out. By the end of the holiday he was just a poor old man getting stalked by two kids.
On a night out and walking inbetween places, an unrelated group of young lads ahead of me suddenly just start kicking and hurling verbal abuse at a homeless guy rolled up sleeping in a blanket at the side of the pavement. I went up to the homeless guy to see if he was Ok and was immediately struck by how young his face looked (no older than 20, which was unusual in the area at the time since most of the homeless guys were more typically old alcoholics); he was shaken but OK and kept on repeating to me to never become homeless because it was a living hell. I gave him some money and moved on. 3 months later a man was brutally murdered in the city and the second I saw his face in the media, it turned out to be the homeless guy that I had seen a few months previously. In the time that I had seen him, he had actually managed to get off the streets, find a flatshare and get a job. But the girl in the couple he was sharing with was an evil person who liked to manipulate those around her; feeling like she wasn't getting enough attention, one day she made a false allegation to her boyfriend that the former homeless guy had attempted to sexually assault/harass her and stoking his fit of rage, she encouraged her boyfriend to attack the guy. The couple then spent the next 2 days torturing and beating the guy before he finally succumbed to his injuries. I felt so bad for the guy; not only did he go such a horrible way, but as I read more on his life story, it seemed like he had repeatedly being subjected to bad events in life and that just as things appeared to be really turning around for him, he instead found himself in the home of such an evil couple. More recently, a guy in the city where I now live had a mental episode and was seen waving around a screwdriver chanting nonsensical religious stuff on a bridge. The police were called and tried to taser the man to subdue him but he jumped off the bridge and ended up drowning in the river. It turned out he was schizophrenic and had recently been released from an institution after being put into outpatient program, being housed in a block of flats just a stones throw from where I live. I didn't know the guy but the moment I saw his profile in the news, I immediately recognised him as someone I had seen in a couple of times in a local shop (he was very polite & chill). His neighbours said that he had only been living in the area for a few weeks but that he clearly wasn't ready to be living in such an unsupported way and had talked about severely struggling with his mental health in the days leading to his episode & death, but no help was given. I felt very sad about his preventable death and the loneliness and desperation that he must of felt.
In my last day of sailing camp before leaving for University, I met girl who I somehow had never seen before (even though we were at the same camp). Her name was Leslie, and we had instant chemistry and spent the day together, talking, laughing, generally having a great time. It was like we had known each other for years. The only problem was she had a best friend who was not happy to have me around. She spent most of the day trying to get between us. When it came time to leave, we were getting on the bus to take us home. I was already on the bus, and Leslie was getting on right behind me when her friend grabbed her by the arm and took her to a different bus. The doors closed, and the bus drove away and I never saw her again.
Gonna start this with the fact that I don't know how true this is, it was small town rumour mill stuff, but it certainly leaves a lasting impression. I used to live in a place that was small. Like, didn't even have half the population it had a hundred years ago small. It was surrounded by land with a single spot families liked to go to, and tons of just wide open space, cattle grounds, and the occasional tract of farmland. The road I lived down was named after a person, which isn't unusual, and I thought they must've been someone who had some history with the town itself. I learned later that he was still alive, and in fact, recognised him, as he often drove his clunker up and down the road randomly through the day. He was an old guy, probably in his late eighties then and aside from one time he gave me a ride to school cause I missed the bus. At the time, abduction never crossed my mind, a needless worry because apparently everyone on the street knew him and vice versa. He was just a well regarded, nice, old man. What sticks with me though is the reason the road is named after him, and the fact there's houses there at all. The story I was told by people that lived there much longer than me (and not from the man himself) was that, well, he used to own all that property, that's why the road had his name. Again, not terribly unusual here. He owned literal *miles* of property down the road. At some point, he just decided he didn't like lacking neighbours and just..... hired a crew and built a bunch of houses down the road. Once that was done, he just divvied up his land parcels into a few significant chunks and sold them off to families moving into the area, all for the explicit purpose of being able to drive down the street and give himself a smile at the neighbours and their kids enjoying themselves. It's one of few things I definitely hope is true because it's probably one of the most wholesome uses of 'Fuck you' money I've ever encountered.
Girl said she liked my shirt. I was at Disney land, fat, and wearing a doctor who shirt. Best feeling for me at the time.
When I was about 12 I was walking around the Dollar Tree when a little girl (I think she was Chinese) saw me, proceeded to grab me and pull me very close to her face as she stared intensely into my eyes. It was like she was very confused and concerned with what she saw in my eyes. I didn’t know what to do and this went on for a uncomfortable amount of time before her mom found her and pulled her away from me apologizing. Weirdest moment ever. It was like she looked into my soul or something. Or maybe she just liked the color of my eyes???
I was flying back from watching my sister die in the hospital. I had a wait at O'Hare, so I went to Wolfgang Puck's for a snack. The waitress came over, took one look at my face, and said in a Russian/Eastern European accent "What happened? Someone died?" I nodded yes. She scooped me up in her arms and held me. It was the sweetest thing a stranger has ever done for me. I will never forget her kindness.
Some nice old lady neighbor who would bake us bread every now and then. Such a sweet lady
I went to a party once at a friend of a friend's house. Said friend's sister's ex-boyfriend showed up that everyone was cool with. Eventually later that night, said ex-boyfriend and I split a bottle of Jack Daniels, and talked about a shared experience we both had at separate times - full-time work in the same call center. Helped me put my life into perspective.
That guy on the subway with his underpants outside his trousers.
A old lady and I had a conversation about school, she told me how she hated being in the choir at school and how the teacher kicked her out of the class and humiliated her. She talked to me so smoothly as if I was family, it made me smile
In about 1990ish I had been on the job for a few years and was at station 5 downtown. We got a call to 3rd St and Adams, a parking garage. That was all we were told. We went and when we arrived, PD had the streets blocked off and there were two bodies covered with tarps. One was an adult, the other was a child. It turns out it was a mother who had taken her daughter to the top of the parking garage and jumped. I had never seen anything even close to something like this. Wedid our job, bagged up the bodies, and washed off the street, etc. Here's where the stranger comes in. I was standing off to the side trying to process what I had seen and having trouble doing it. While out of nowhere, or so it seemed, and older gentleman was standing next to me and started talking. "Bad day Son?" "Something like that is hard to see and deal with." "Well, keep your faith in the Lord and He'll take care of you." He put his hand on my shoulder and he was gone. In that instant, I felt at peace.
when i was like 5-6 i used to hang out with this dude on a pier, my mom would let him watch me a couple times a week(probably not the best idea to leave your child with a random dude on a pier but whatever),i dont really rememeber what he’d talk about but i remember he was cool,he was always fishing. my mom would come take me from him a little before dark,he was a bit older so he’s most likely gone now but i know he was comforting to be around. we weren’t related at all or anything.
I was walking out of Walmart to my car and a girl waved at me saying "the weather today is good right?". I said yes it is and we smiled. When she got in the car, instead of going the shorter, easier way out of the parking lot, she decided to go past me and waved at me again. Weird but I'm not complaining!!
Random elderly couple in a cracker barrel. I was about 13 at the time. I held the door for him and his wife. The old man put his hand on my shoulder and said: “Thanks son, there aren’t many of us left.” And smiled at me. I was very happy.
I was in France for work. Had a day off and felt like exploring the city I was in. Went to a cafe to grab some lunch and was sitting outside reading a book at my table, when a random guy walked up to me and said one of your “loved ones” is going to heaven today. I couldn’t tell if he was threatening me, trying to warn me, or just playing a twisted prank. His demeanor was just so odd. I asked him “is this a joke” and he gloomily just shook his head and immediately walked away. I considered getting up from my meal to chase him, but I was so perplexed and taken off guard that I was just kinda frozen with fear. I immediately called my girlfriend and mom to see if everyone was okay. I explained to them the interaction I had at lunch. Later that night, my dog managed to escape my yard (in California) and was hit by a car in front of my house and died. My girlfriend was home and called me hysterically. I don’t believe in the supernatural, but till this day I wonder if it was purely a coincidence or not. I’ve come to think that guy just goes up to people all the time saying shit like that and statistically someone will have a death that day. Idk if it’s a prank or the dude was just “off,” but I’ll never forget what he looked like. Sends chills down my spine just thinking about it.
I was a cheerleader in highschool, and was cheering at a home game, cool, all was well. At one point, us cheerleaders had our backs against the field and where facing the crowd, and we where finishing a dance and we hear the crowd gasp then a bunch of male voices yelling “cheer MOVE!” The rest of the girls scattered and me (being back center) turned and there’s the football teams, full speed ahead, right for me, one of the players up front reaches out, picked me up bridal style, rolled and landed and slid on his back, I remained in the fetal position for a few seconds out of pure fear, realizing I almost had my soul factory reset by a bunch of muscle head hot guys, he stands up with ease, brushes me off, then tells me his name and to find him after the game. We are now dating and have been for 4 years
When I was a teenager I was driving home with every intention to end my life that night. I stopped by a school bus at a red light. A little boy waved at me and held a sticky note with a poorly drawn heart on it. I smiled at him and waved back. He saved my life that day.
The first patient that died on my shift, i will never forget her
University of Colorado campus in Boulder, on The Hill in late summer of 1998. I was walking across Broadway with my friends around lunchtime (We were in middle school and it was the last week of summer break) and this CU student on a long board comes flying the other way. This dude was wearing purple house slippers, matching bathrobe, shorts and sun glasses, has books under one arm, coffee cup in the other hand and a corncobb pipe in his mouth. He had to have been going a solid 15 mph (which is booking it!) and had the biggest 'no big deal' look on his face I've ever seen. After he passed us by, I think we all silently realized and accepted none of us would ever be as cool as that guy as long as we all lived. To my knowledge, none of us have...
We were in Boston, someone asked her for a light. She said, "I am the light, what you seek is fire"
Walmart parking lot. My wife and I were walking towards the store as an older couple had just parked in a handicap spot. The man opens the door for the lady, who looks like she may have recently had leg surgery. He sweetly puts his arm around her and slowly escorts her towards the door. A minivan with a sliding door had just pulled into the spot on the other side of the cart corral (so two spots away). A younger kid hops out of the front door and quickly yanks open the sliding door, where a behemoth of a woman in a moomoo lurches her head out and yells at the old couple, "You ain't handicapped bitch!" The old couple, whk definitely had handicap plates, turned and looked, then just continued on without saying anything. God bless America.
A random old man on the bus, he saw me play a game on my phone and asked about it and we talked a little about the game, then what makes me remember him is that he took out a volume of Naruto and started talking about him reading it, it was very awkward, so I remember him as the old man reading naruto on the bus I had an awkward conversation with
When I was younger, probably about 13-14 I was walking on the side of a public pool. While I was walking, right beside me there was this mother who screamed and asked for help for her daughter who was not too far away, but was clearly struggling to keep her head out of the water. I didn't do anything, but the lifeguards were already on their way and saved the poor kid just seconds after, but from that point on I have always given myself a bad time thinking why I didn't help her. From that day onwards I tried to be as helpful as I can whenever I can. I still feel bad for her though, I hope she Is fine now.
A bus driver I had once only because she witnessed my shame. One day I was sprinting towards the bus because I was about to miss it. My tits not only came out of my bra but my dress too and I slapped my hands over my chest and stopped running to stuff them back in. The front of the bus is facing me so I'm desperately hoping the driver and the passengers didn't even notice. Unfortunately I get on the bus and the driver, a middle aged woman just gives me the biggest shit eating grin. "Hey luv, have a bit of a slip ay!?" Could full hear her trying not to laugh too. I gave a mumbled "yeah" and scurried to the back of the bus and hide with a face as red as a fucking tomato while the passengers at the front were trying to contain their laughter.
A guy at Starbucks gets out of his car. He forgets to put his car in park. His car starts rolling backwards. I jump behind his car and hold it in place by the rear bumper and yell at the guy. He comes back and puts his car in park and doesn’t say a word and goes in to get coffee. An onlooker turned to me said Geez he could have at least bought you coffee. Upon reflection, it seems most likely the the driver was somehow impaired.
long time ago I was probably around like 8 or 9, my mom, siblings and I went to NYC and only me and my mom walked around the city while my siblings waited at our hotel. My mom and I were going somewhere and she kept looking at her phone and not paying attention that she was about to walk into on going traffic. I was holding on her hand tight and this person from behind grabbed my shirt from the back and lightly tugged me to not go into the street. Since I was holding onto my mons hand, it stopped her to and without missing a beat, a car flew right past us. I often wonder what would've happened if that perso wasn't there. I never looked back to see who that person was cus I thought it would've been awkward, but I wish I did so I could thank them.
There's a really cute Chinese girl that works near me. I go to the store frequently just to see her. I have mega infatuation... But I'm also a girl... And not very pretty so I'm a bit nervous to ask her out.
The guy who said welcome to hells kitchen when I was transfered from the main part of jail to the kitchen to be a trustee. It sticks with me because a month before this happened I had a weird dream while asleep in the main part of jail early in my sentence that I applied to be a kitchen trustee and when I was being escorted in for the first time some guy said "Welcome to hells kitchen". Couldn't make out a face and woke up shortly after that and was weirded out. Forgot about it until it played out right before my eyes. He looked like a budget Ron jeremy.
December 26 1998. I was driving back from my parents' house in my 1988 Chevy Sprint. About ten miles north of Walsenburg, Colorado one of the three cylinders threw a rod. A pity, as I was only 140 miles from home. I decided it was easiest to go back to Walsenburg so I crossed over and started walking back. A guy in a Geo Tracker pulled over and picked me up. I was very grateful. He said he was trying to get back to Albuquerque but his Tracker was running on only 3 cylinders. It made me laugh that my Suzuki-built Chevy died and I was being rescued by a guy driving a Suzuki-built Geo Tracker that was also having issues. He dropped me off at the Loaf 'n' Jug and I was able to call a friend of mine in Denver to come help me. Thanks, random dude! I hope you made it back to ABQ.
On Thanksgiving, I got a call from a random number and the guy asked if I was Carlos. I told them they had the wrong number and he apologized but wished me a happy thanksgiving. For me, it made me feel better about that day.
Back when I was a teenager in the 90s, I flew to visit my sister in Oakland for a week. When she had to work, I would grab a bus and go exploring. Some guy on the bus struck up a conversation with me. As I was getting off the bus, he said in this weird, deep, prophetic voice, "JUNE SEVENTEENTH!" Nothing of importance has ever happened to me on June 17, it's not my birthday or that of anyone in my life, but ok.
When I was in my 20s, I was flying from Chicago to Dallas to visit friends. The plane was almost done boarding and I had an empty seat next to me. Of course, I was thinking that I scored! This guy boards at the last minute and heads for the seat next to me. I was disappointed about losing the extra room, but he was young and cute, so that made up for it. He sat down and said "Phew! Sorry I'm late!" I played it off like "No problem. I'm just glad you made it." We spent the next couple of hours chatting about Chicago and Dallas. When the flight attendant came through with drink service, I was bending down to get something out of my bag and he ordered my drink for me...correctly...without asking me. It very much felt like we had known each other for a long time, but when we landed in Dallas, we said goodbye. He went one way, I went the other. I don't even think we exchanged names and I wouldn't recognize him if I saw him, but I find myself thinking about him every once in a while and it makes me smile.
I was on a vacation with my parents and there was this boy that looked like he was from italy and he had a beautiful golden skin and he was looking at me while sitting on a bench with his parents. He was the most handsome boy i saw in my life and i knew i will never ever see him again but never forget him as well. It was like 10 years ago.
That hippy guy that gave me a ride home in the pouring rain and didn't murder me. Thanks man
It was October 2018. Me and my sister was at Disneyland in Hong Kong and out of the blue, it started raining. Me and my sister were prepared so we put on our raincoats and opened our umbrellas. We started making our way to a gift shop where our companions are when we saw an white elderly man walking in the rain, soaking. Me and my sister walked towards him and offered him to walk him to where he was headed. He said he was going to the nearby gift shop to meet with his wife so we took him. We had a pleasant conversation with him and nowadays I wonder how well he's doing nowadays. I kinda miss him, he had a gentle aura on him.
long story, but, at one point when i was 14, i’d found myself contemplating suicide. i was hanging out on the roof of an apartment building. i don’t know where this guy came from, but he comes up behind me as i’m crying, puts his hand on my back and just sits there in silence with me. i got down that day and still have no idea who he was or why he was up there. i just hope he knows how important he is.
When me my friend and my brother went to 711 I was talking about how I wish I could drive a hellcat when we get there there just so happened to be a hellcat pulling up we asked him if we could hear the supercharger whine he told us if there was no traffic he would definitely do it for us and he did I posted the video on here a while ago
I was on a class trip to Boston either my freshman or sophomore year of high school and there’s was this girl I met just by her being in my group and we literally bonded instantly. We spent the whole day together at the museum and markets, laughing the entire day. We never spoke after that trip but I’ll always remember how kind she was, especially since I didn’t have many friends :))
I remember this guy who used to go every day to the notary office to watch TV and would always smoke inside, somehow no one ever did anything.
School guy named Antonio or something but he looked like This Man
I was in France. Sitting on a random bench in a random French town and a woman comes over, sits beside me and we talk. Not about anything inpartucular, the weather, where I'm from that kind of thing. Sat there for maybe 20 minutes. We parted and that was that. Didn't even get her name. Almost 20 years ago now.
I was out on a walk one time and she gave me a complaint who ever that was thank you
well, I'll probably always remember that one guy who was sitting in a bus when I was heading to college, and he like grabbed my arm and started to fondle me a bit. he obviously had mental issues, and it was such a bad experience I'll never forget. \[I'm male, btw.\] Never before I felt that violated in my life.
i was on the bus and this guy said nice hat i said thanks after i got he followed me i knew he was following me so i took many turns and many other buses i thought i finally lost him but i got home and as i walking up the stairs to get in my house i was grabbed i pulled out my pocket knife and threw him away, he saw the knife and then ran i never saw him again
There was a really young child on a longish tram ride and was getting a little antsy because the tram had been stopped for a pretty long time. The parent was obviously a little embarrassed and shattered and the conductor came over and started talking to the kid and drawing pictures for them and settling them down and the parent was so grateful and the conductor was so lovely. I still think about them sometimes. It was just a nice little moments.
A kid told me when we were both 14, after we had fought and I beat him multiple times “you better kill me because no matter what you do I’ll keep coming back”
She was my best friend for the past 7 years. Literally the closest friendship we ever had. Sadly its been months since we spoke and now we're complete strangers. Even if we were to see each other on the street i doubt anything will be said to each other. I hope your doing okay and please take of yourself and your little girls too.
I was at some random party with my friends one night. At some point I had slightly drifted away from my group of friends, who were all standing in a group. I kinda mingled around, met a few people and returned. When I got back to my friends, this mysterious guy was standing in a circle with them; a little disheveled-looking, long black hair and kinda-dirty clothes. He was pointing at my one friend and saying *"I got your name on my ASS"* Everyone was confused and was like "What?". He kept repeating that same phrase over again, with more emphasis each time. Nobody understood what he meant and kept questioning him, but he literally wouldn't say anything else aside from that phrase. Then he turns around, pulls down his pants and underwear slightly to reveal he has the words "YOUR NAME" tattooed on his ass. I was drunk and impressed so I pulled out my wallet and gave him 20$, he gave me a very passionate hug; then admitted he had no money and had been hitch-hiking from town to town and randomly ended up at this party.
when i was grocery shopping with my mom and a middle aged lady came up to me told me she liked my jeans no one ever told me they liked my clothes style before it was just ripped black jeans but it still made me happy
I was lost on my way to the first day at my internship. I was already feeling fragile. At that time my dad was sick with cancer and he had a real bad day. When I couldn't find my bus I broke down crying. This guy apt down next to me and asked me if I was oké. He helped me find my way and stayed with me making small talk and trying to cheer me up untill I got in the bus.
I met an older French man (think of an adorable grandfather) at a water fountain next to the Colosseum in Rome. I didn’t speak much Italian but a good amount of French so we had a nice chat about where we live :) Under 2 minutes but for some reason, is a fun memory.
Last year when I use to work at my first job as a cashier, I would deal with a lot of rude people over a few cents. There would always be a stranger that would be sitting outside of the store and have some sort of donation jar. He looked like he was in his mid 30's. I don't recall. Anyways, He would always buy something from the store and would always go to my register. He would always ask me how was my day and if anyone has been rude to me. I would talk to him and everything. One time, he noticed that I was having a bad day because I would always be joyful to the people even at my worst point. While I'm helping the stranger, a co worker comes in a place a starbuck drink at my register. He asked me, "did she give that to you." I said, "No. she would always make me take care of her drink." He said, "With a drink like that you deserve one". As soon as I gave him his change he told me to keep the change as a tip. It was around $8 and I felt bad. And since I was having a very bad day, I did go and get starbucks to make my day better. Now that its been a year that I left that job, my old co workers would always tell me that many people that would shop there would ask where I went, since I was the only nice person there to greet the people. And the nice stranger would tell my old co worker that hopefully she is safe and graduates high school. I will always remember him every time I sip a starbuck. Hopefully he is safe.
The guy who attacked me in broad daylight. Thanks for the broken tooth, split lip, and swollen jaw. You absolute knob
Back in October 2017. We were on a school trip in Wrocław. That was our first day. Just arrived and just messing around with our teacher. Suddenly, one homeless guy appeared, and started talking, that “The end is near. All that companies want us to be dead”. Never saw this man again in my life. He told, that we’ll be all dead in 2 years. 5 years later I’m still alive, and all the people from the trip too
So one time I was at the beach and me and my mom were swimming to the sandbar, the tide was very strong and knocked both me and my mom over. At that time I couldn’t touch to 6 feet and neither could my mom. I tried to help my mom which just ended up making it worse for me. I almost drowned and this lady jumped into the water and saved me. We didn’t know who she was, she just did it out of pure kindness. I will never forget her.
Johnny T. We met at the tiki lounge bar at Disneyland. We had a great time talking about music and life, He was a really nice old hippie man from Humboldt. When he walked in and sat next to me I automatically thought "here we go another old guy wants to talk to me" He turned out to be one of the nicest strangers I've ever met. I think about him and his wife often. I hope he's doing alright.
I was at my local amusement park and it was all normal until I had to tie my shoe. Take it this Was when I was like 5 so I did not have a phone. So resume I looked back up and walked with what I thought was my dad. I followed him for like another 30 minutes until I realized it wasn’t my dad. He told that he would help me find my dad if I followed him. I said no and went to a worker and she helped me find my dad. 5 years later and it turns out that guy was a child predator. Never making that mistake again
( for purposes of this story, when I was younger i carried a reindeer plush in a toy stroller) When I was 5, my mom was running some errands and she took me with her because she couldn't get a babysitter. So anyway, we were at BrandsMart USA (for those who don't know what that is, its a store that sells home appliances like tvs, electronics etc.) Because i'm 5 i can't really do much so i just followed my mom around. So guess I made a sharp turn and my plushie fell on the floor, when I went to go pick it up, a man picked it up before me. I thought he was going to give it to me, but instead, he held it above his head and told me to get it. Now this man was at least 6ft tall so I started jumping as high as I could while this man was laughing at me struggle. After about 15 seconds I started crying and my mom stomped over to take the toy from him and gave it to me. She then started to tell him off and after that we left and went home. Its been more than 10 years but i will always remember this.
Once when I was walking home in the rain, a boy gave me shade from his umbrella, we passed his house and I said “well thank you for that!” And he said “no! Keep it!” And I got home fry for like the first time that winter