Dan Loves His Family (The Unexpected)

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Wednesday, February 10 - The Laugh Shop, Edmonton
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Saturday, March 13 - OSCW The Union
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My family bought me a laptop!!!

I am flabbergasted.

My sister stopped by yesterday while I was getting ready for a date(*) and dropped it off. I didn't ask for it. I'm not sure I NEED it--though I can see it coming in damn handy now that I have it.

I think it was the gesture, more than anything.

I have a good family. They always come through when expected. But an unexpected kindness at an unexpected time...that means a lot.

I've noticed a lot of that lately. Over the last little while, I've received a lot of unexpected kindness in surprising ways from surprising (and not-so-surprising)sources.

What gives it more meaning is that those acts of kindness have come now, at a point where I'm feeling I don't have much to give anybody in return.

It's tough, leaning on people. It's easy to feel embarassed or weak or even resentful. But as I touched on in this article, I think there is something to learning to receive without being expected to pay it back, 'deserve it' or 'earn' it somehow.

It's strange but learning how to receive is helping me understand more what it means to give.

I'm looking forward to putting it into practice.

"O Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life"
-Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

(*) I mention this because it is likely going to be my last date for a while. I still love the "meeting new people" aspect, but despite my efforts to mix it up in terms of personalities and process, I feel like I'm piloting through the first three levels of a video game over and over. There's only so many different things that can happen and once you've experienced them all to the point they become predictable, it's hard to stay passionate about playing.