You'll never believe what Ray did in Professor No One's Awake's class!

This was the kind of class in which people would love to fall asleep; on most occasions, the lights were dimmed to make it even easier! But on this particular day, “Prof. No Ones Awake” ( Professor Wayne Nokes) had something really interesting to say. He related how doing a good deed is similar to a ripple in the water. When an object is dropped into water, it forms ripples and the ripple grows in diameter until it becomes a huge semi circular arc. It then reaches its bank. Likewise, when somebody does a good deed or is just happy in nature, it has an impact on the other people around him. And this effect affects a whole lot of other people and so on. The lecture was so interesting that it actually kept Larry Sullivan awake throughout the lecture. Never before in the past two months had Larry stayed awake throughout one of “No Ones Awake’s” lectures. The impact was so profound on Larry that he talked about it all morning. Then during lunch break, we went to our favorite seat in the food court and Larry babbled on to his other friends about how this whole idea has given him a new perspective on life.

“Ï mean, I never thought about this whole thing, you know. If I do something nice to somebody or a group of people, I would indirectly entice them into be nice to the people they interact and that is pretty huge!”

“Yeah, but it is not always practical buddy.” I said.

“Why? What do you mean?”

“Of course, most of the time it is obvious – like, out of the blue, telling somehow how much you appreciate their work! But, I mean, it requires you to let the other person know that you are actually doing a nice thing for them. You get me? It is almost like an advertisement. You do something and then you somehow have to let the person know that you did such a thing for them.”

“Not true, every action has a reaction,” said Larry defensively. He finished off the burger he was eating and continued on. “For example, see that person putting those trays away?” he said pointing at an Asian campus employee who keeps the food court tidy. “I am going to do a good deed and put my tray away myself.” Saying that off went Larry with the tray and returned after dumping the contents and then he wiped the table clean with the tissue paper.

“That is one table less for him to clean and he doesn’t know what I just did and in the end of the day, if I enticed somebody else to do the same, that’s a lot fewer tables for him to clean and he is happy. Get my point?”

“Slighly far fetched, but sure.”

“Fine! Time will tell. There will be a time when I would…say, has anyone seen my car keys?”said Larry, suddenly feeling his pockets. It was not in his pockets nor in his bag.

“It was not an the tray that you just disposed, was it?” I asked.

He stared at me for a bit. “Oh my God” he exclaimed.

We tried our best to suppress our laughter, but with vain. Soon the Asian staff member was called and he and Larry opened the bin and started searching for the car keys. “For somebody you tried to make happy, he certainly doesn’t look pleased.” Said Burt observing the lines on his small forehead clearly indicating annoyance.

“Remind me to go back to sleep in Psych 101.” Grumbled Larry as he searched for his car keys. He did find his keys and henceforth kept his smart ideas to himself and went to sleep in every following Psych 101 class.

But, he never let that, or any other incident such as this, deter him from what he believed. He did make a conscious effort to make someone feel special everyday. He got so good at it, in fact, that on the last day of classes, he told Professor No One’s Awake how his one lecture (the only one he ever paid attention to) transformed his life and people around him and told our professor how thankful he was. The class gave him a round of applause and the professor was taken back by the whole gesture. And did this action have a positive reaction?

Yes, next week we had the easiest paper that Professor Wayne Nokes had ever set. That made me a believer.

Try it, mates, if anything, it will make you feel good about yourselves!