90 Countries and Back Again

As you all know, I am still working on my list of things I want to do in life.  Today I had an opportunity arise to cross an item off my list. While I was waiting to shoot, I met an older man seated alone in a back corner of the restaurant quietly enjoying his bottle of wine.  When he stood up to walk to the restroom I realized he used a walker to make his way through the walkway.  He smiled and made conversation with myself and Nicole.  What started out as a cute joke, turned into a great story of how this man had traveled around the world prior to him ending up there, retired and lonely.  Clearly, he had been to amazing places and experienced many memories I can't even dream up, but here he was alone.  The realization of how life plays itself out hit me hard in those few moments we shared discussing his youth.  Here stood a man who had obviously done so much but had no one to share this with.  He told me he travels to this restaurant three times a week to enjoy its staff and escape the Dutch food from his retirement community cafeteria and this saddened me.  At that exact moment I knew I had to surprise this gentleman the same way I had been surprised so many years previously when I went to pay my bill and my waitress told me it had been taken care of.  It was that random act of kindness that made me want to pay it forward, but it wasn't until today that I thought I had found someone that would benefit from it and be truly grateful.  So, I'm sure as he tried to pay his bill well after we were gone, he was pleasantly surprised by two young women and the generosity they shared as a thank you to his wise words about life.