My faith in humanity has been restored...again

Not that I haven't always wanted to expect the best of people, but let's be honest, we are often let down by society. All you have to do is watch one NBC Nightly News airing and you begin to feel just a little worse about humanity and the choices made every day. It can be difficult at times to see the good in people. A couple of weeks ago, I witnessed it first hand.

My husband flew to Austin for a science teachers' conference. When he picked up his checked bags from baggage claim, he set his book bag down on a chair to find his car keys. He was struggling to find them, and inadvertently set a flip video camera (which belongs to the school) and his jump drive on the chair. When he found the keys, he grabbed his stuff and took off.

A couple of days later, I got an email, via Facebook, from a woman I didn't know. She told me that she was flying through the Lubbock airport and found my camera and jump drive. I was very confused, because not only did I have my camera and jump drive, but I hadn't been anywhere near the airport. I proceeded to share this with my husband, who after a couple of beats, got up and got his book bag. Sure enough, the mystery was solved.

This total stranger, who could have procured for herself an expensive new camera and thumb drive, took the time to research the drive and track me down. She then shipped it to me, asking nothing in return. She was just a good person. I'm grateful to Karen Sitton James and her husband for reminding me that good is out there all around us.

Artistic endeavors and all that it implies...

Spending the greatest part of my adulthood in the St. Louis area provided me with an opportunity to be exposed to some truly great artistic minds. In my twenties, I was fortunate to meet some extraordinary talents on the local music scene and was able to follow them on a somewhat regular basis. Thanks to the magic of Facebook, I've recently reconnected with some of those musicians and I'm reminded again of how much I enjoyed that time in my life and of how much those folks influenced me in my own artistic endeavors, however small they may be.

I would go to watch bands like Red Weather and The Unconscious and marvel at what they did, both as groups and as individual artists. My friend, Jeanne, and I would go see them whenever possible (much to the amusement of some of the Red Weather musicians) and became friends with some of them. They looked at the world in a way I had never seen before and it was fascinating to me. It made me want to work harder at being an artist.

How they aren't performing in the national spotlight is still a mystery to me, especially since there's a lot out there that doesn't come close to what I've seen and heard from them. I don't think that was ever the ultimate goal for them, however. They love what they do, and I'm thrilled to have been a beneficiary. So to Dan Rubright, Ted Rubright, Tom Fulton, John Taylor, Lisa Campell, Mike Apirion, Jim Mayer, Peter Mayer and so many others on the St. Louis music scene, I say thanks. I have been and am enriched knowing you.