Giving (pie) = joy

Sometimes giving something to someone is actually as much for oneself as it is for the other person.

I am so tempted to just leave it there.

But here I go, a little further.

My friend Rupert had a bit of a car accident. A truck accident. A truck hit him and knocked him over in his wheelchair and broke his femur. He's in the hospital, awaiting some surgery to fix his leg.  For those of you who know him, and those of you who don't but still care, he's OK. Not hurt worse than a broken leg, but it sucks to have a broken leg when all you were doing was coming home from Safeway with some groceries.  I was feeling far away from him, and also really sad about the passing of another friend, and just needed to feel better about the world. So I thought hard for a minute, and then decided what I needed to do to surprise and delight Rupert. I needed to get someone to bring him some sweet potato pie. How was I going to do that from across the country? I thought hard for a minute, and then I realized that's what Task Rabbit is for. I'd never used it before, so I went online and signed up, and within five minutes I was posting this: Small delivery for today: Pick up a sweet potato pie and deliver it to my friend who is in Emmanuel hospital with a broken leg.

A couple hours later, a Task Rabbit named Autumn walked into Rupert's room with the pie, and left it for him while he was on the phone. She then texted me and told me that she had completed the task, and that he was on the phone, but seemed in good spirits.

DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH JOY THIS BROUGHT ME?????

(A lot.)

There is great joy in executing delightful surprises. And some of that joy is actually selfish.