Quick to Judge

There was a posting on Facebook, a man telling the story of why he was posting a 'selfie' with a cup of coffee, and making a peace sign. Apparently the man got cut off in traffic, and was yelled at and given the finger.

He followed the culprit off the road to the coffee shop, didn't see him and got in line. The other man came out of the bathroom and stood behind him.

The first man (the one who got cut off, am I making any sense here?) offered to buy the other man a coffee and explained who he was.

The man was having a difficult and stressful time, and apologized. And, apparently he did use his blinker but didn't know it was burnt out.

The point of the message, was not to jump to judgement, everyone has a story.

This was timely, as I thought of this kind of thing when I saw a teenager walking along the street the other day. The sun was shining, but it was by no means a warm day. It was still coat weather, and yet here was this teen walking along wearing only a short sleeved T-shirt.

My first thought, what a stupid kid, who was he trying to impress? He was obviously cold, shoulders hunched, hands in his pockets.

Second thought was...where were his parents, letting him out like that? I can't blame the parents, who might have had to leave for work before the teen left the house, and we all know that for a teenager, peer pressure is greater than parental disapproval.

Then I thought, maybe he'd been bullied, and some other kids had stolen his coat. This almost happened to my son once, so a plausible theory. My last thought was maybe he had a bad home life, and his father had kicked him out, not caring if he was dressed or where he might go.

Of all these scenarios, I hope he was just some dumb kid, thinking he's tougher than the weather.