A stranger's kindness

Sometimes, you'll be going about doing your own thing and some random stranger will strike up a conversation. I've grown to love them random conversations.

For instance yesterday evening, I was on the train home from college and a woman sat down opposite me with loads of luggage. Now, I was in no form for talking because I was sick to my stomach with worry over exams and the like. But anyways, she asked me if I was going to Dublin and I said no, just Athenry. From there, we started talking about college subjects and she told me some lovely stories about her family.

She informed me that she was heading to Dublin to catch a flight to Australia to see one of her daughters in Sydney who was graduating as a social worker. She has another daughter in Melbourne and a son doing Medicine in Dublin. She was still coming to terms with the fact that she was *actually* going to Australia and would be returning to Ireland again before Christmas. She mentioned how for Christmas, her two daughters would be returning with her but how her husband and son don't know anything about it. What a lovely surprise that will be. Her daughters haven't been home for Christmas in 3 years and now they are returning this year as a surprise. I thought it was very heartwarming and shows the real meaning of family.

She, herself, is a speech therapist so knew alot about Psychology (which I hope to do) and she was saying how she is considering a return to college to do a PostGrad in Psychology aswell.

Her daughter in Sydney did the same subjects as I'm doing now in college so we had some common ground.

I can only apologise by the way, for my constant repetiton of she this and she that - I didnt catch her name.

For the 20 minutes that I was on the train, I had a lovely conversation and unbeknownst to her, she helped take my mind off my exams. Its amazing how a random strangers kindness can help so much.

It is only after something like that, that you really realise how a small bit of kindness goes a long, long way.