This act of kindness forged a friendship between two strangers (and totally went viral)
Four days ago, 30-year-old Brooke Ochoa of Louise, Texas decided to go out for lunch. But what she got was much more than a lunch. She made a new friend.
On Thursday, August 6th, Brooke took to Facebook to share the encounter. “Today I [went] to eat at a restaurant for lunch and I saw this elder lady coming from afar so I waited to hold the door for her, [and] she was very thankful and sweet,” Brooke wrote on Facebook. “She then told the waitress, ‘table for one’, so I waited and hesitated but then I walked over and said, ‘I’m eating by myself too would you like to have lunch together?'”
The woman, whose name is Delores, was totally thrilled by Brooke’s offer. “She was ecstatic,” Brooke wrote. “Come to find out she spent the last decade living with her mom who recently passed away and her aunt who recently was put into a nursing home, so she has been having a hard time being alone.”
Brooke and Delores had a lovely talk over their lunch and became fast friends. “We had a wonderful talk, and she just kept smiling and saying thank you for listening to me, which made me smile too,” Brooke wrote. “Her words healed my heart just as much as [I] healed her lonely one. By far the best decision I’ve made all year!”
Ever since Brooke shared her experience with Facebook on Thursday, her post has been liked over 2 million times and shared over 250,000 times. The post also has over 140,000 comments, and almost all of them express their amazement over the beauty of this story. After all, you never know who is feeling down and lonely. They could be just one booth down from you, but often, we feel as though we can’t reach out to those we don’t know. . . despite the fact that you could end up making a wonderful new friend.
“. . . all I wanted was to make a difference in one persons life. . . to be kind, to do better, to see that being there for someone else can fill your heart with just as much happiness too,” Brooke wrote on Facebook yesterday about the encounter. “It was never a boast, just a post that [I] thought would make others take a step back, make a change and smile. Glad that is exactly what happened.”
This made our hearts so much bigger. Random acts of kindness aren’t just temporary — they can create long-lasting friendships that truly enrich lives. We’re totally inspired by the fact that Brooke and Delores were to able to show each other genuine compassion without even knowing each other. Of course, that’s all changing.
According to Brooke, she and Delores will be having lunch every single Thursday from now on. Weekly lunch besties forever.
(Image via Facebook)
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