THE LIST

One day a teacher asked her students to list the names
of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper,
leaving a space between each name.

Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they
could say about each of their classmates and write it
down.

It took the remainder of the class period to finish
their assignment, and as the students left the room,
each one handed in the papers.

That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each
student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what
everyone else had said about that individual.

On Monday she gave each student his or her list. Before
long, the entire class was smiling. 'Really?' she heard whispered.
'I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!' and,
'I didn't know others liked me so much,' were most
of the comments.

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. She
never knew if they discussed them after class or with
their parents, but it didn't matter.
The exercise had accomplished its purpose.

The students were happy with themselves and one another.

That group of students moved on.

Several years later, one of the students was killed in
Vietnam and his teacher attended the funeral of that
special student. She had never seen a serviceman in a
military coffin before.

He looked so handsome, so mature.

The church was packed with his friends. One by one
those who loved him took a last walk by the coffin.
The teacher was the last one to bless the coffin

As she stood there, one of the soldiers who acted as
pallbearer came up to her. 'Were you Mark's math
teacher?' he asked. She nodded: 'yes.' Then he said:
'Mark talked about you a lot.'

After the funeral, most of Mark's former classmates
went together to a luncheon..... Mark's mother and
father were there, obviously waiting to speak with
his teacher.

'We want to show you something,' his father said,
taking a wallet out of his pocket 'They found this
on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might
recognize it.'

Opening the billfold, he carefully removed two worn
pieces of notebook paper that had obviously been taped,
folded and refolded many times....... The teacher knew
without looking that the papers were the ones on which
she had listed all the good things each of Mark's class
mates had said about him.

'Thank you so much for doing that,' Mark's mother said.
'As you can see, Mark treasured it.'

All of Mark's former classmates started to gather around.
Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said, 'I still have
my list. It's in the top drawer of my desk at home.'

Chuck's wife said, 'Chuck asked me to put his in our
wedding album..'

'I have mine too,' Marilyn said. 'It's in my diary'

Then Vicki, another classmate, reached into her pocket
book, took out her wallet and showed her worn and
frazzled list to the group. 'I carry this with me at
all times,' Vicki said and without batting an eyelash,
she continued: 'I think we all saved our lists'

That's when the teacher finally sat down and cried.
She cried for Mark and for all his friends who would
never see him again.

The density of people in society is so thick that we
forget that life will end one day. And we don't know
when that one day will be.

So please, tell the people you love and care for, that
they are special and important... Tell them, before it
is too late.