So I got home from fencing tonight (a very good practice, and the ending at 9:00 was nice), and Andria and Cait were hanging out in the hall near my door. They accosted me and started telling me the things they liked about me as a person, and then apologized generally for being jerks, which they seem to think that they are most of the time. This including mention of the fact that we don't hang out very much but they like me a lot anyway, although Andria thinks that many of the things she does might scare me (really, Andria. I hang out with SSFFS and the fencing team. I don't scare as easily as I look. But that's a discussion for another day.). Now, if you don't know Andria and Cait, I must say that they are not very high on my list of people who I expect to walk up to me and have a Serious Talk about all the things that they think make me a good person. But hey, I'll take compliments from unexpected sources.

And today at lunch, I don't remember how, I got on the topic of Appreciations. This is a tradition that we had in the school I went to for 7th and 8th grade; the entire school (k-8) would have an assembly at the end of each year where people would just stand up and say things that they appreciated about other people. And yes, it was Really Boring. The junior highers in particular tended to complain about how deadly it was. But I never did, much as it bored me, because even at 14, I realized how unique an assembly that was, and what it said about the community that created it. So I really tried to appreciate Appreciations. Yes, even the Jane's groupers (k and 1st) when Maddy stood up to say that yesterday Lena shared her apple pieces with her at lunch and she (Maddy) really appreciated it, which happened an awful lot.

So as I took my shower, I was thinking about how uncommon it for people to tell people what they like about each other, what they appreciate. And I think that people would be a lot happier if this happened slightly more frequently. ( Read more... )