Why I Am Nice to Strangers

      I think we all have that one Facebook friend that will "like" everything you do even though you haven't seen or spoken to them in maybe 5-6 years?  Occasionally they'll Facebook message you to start a conversation but it'll come off as creepy and you'll bite the insides of your cheeks wondering what on earth you guys could talk about because, well… you haven't seen/spoken to them in 5-6 years.

A few weeks ago I wrote a story in my fiction class about a girl who falls in love with this hot guy with a sign over his head that says "I-Have-Everything-Going-For-Me" who ends up killing himself.  It sounds depressing but I made the ending kind of sweet so maybe I'll post it one of these days, we'll see.  ANYWAYS, so everyone in my class criticized the hell out of it (as always).

Side note: In this class we were asked to write about a funny embarrassing moment so I wrote

about this one time (it was true, but it was a fiction class so people thought I 

made it up) when I was waiting in this kid's car while texting my friend "Omg I'm

nervous what if I fart in his car" only to have sent the text to him, etc., etc.

I KID YOU NOT, a girl in my class blatantly said, "This story was not funny."

So that was really awkward considering it was true and embarrassing and who

doesn't hysterically die laughing when people start talking about farting?

     Back to reality: Several people in the class told me my story was unrealistic because I made the guy character to be such a cool, suave, confident guy and it was "too unexpected."  I sat in silence because I was hoping and praying someone would understand me and then after about literally 5-10 minutes on the subject, someone finally got it.  This kid raised his hand and said, "I think that's what she was going for though, because a lot of the times when someone kills themselves it's always the kid you 'least expect it from.'"  And I swear in that moment… I heard the hallelujah chorus.  I was so happy someone actually understood where I was coming from and agreed with the way I had written my story.

   I think we all know someone who has either taken their own life, or a friend who knows someone who took their own life.  I have heard so many stories about people feeling ignored on social media sites and to us it seems like that random kid who is just saying hi but to them, it could be a little cry of help.
    I never thought that would be me. A kid that I had been ignoring for a few weeks turned out to have issues with depression and often spoke of taking his own life.  Although we never spoke of this over Facebook, learning that he was depressed changed the way I viewed him.

    You never know what people are going through, what battles they face on a daily basis, what shit they're dealing with.  You can't know all that by looking at someone's profile picture or latest Instagram post and you can't even tell that by looking at someone in person, either.  That is why I am nice to strangers, that is why I reply to that random kid I haven't seen/heard from in 5-6 years.  That is why the kid that I thought was being annoying turned out to just be lonely, he only wanted a friend to talk to.  You just never know.