It has always been said that you never know when you will make an impact on someone's life, so always wear a happy face, after my experience last night, nothing could be more true.

After a long day of work and two night meetings to attend, I was feeling a little tired and maybe even a tad bit of self pity for being so busy and having deadlines to meet.

To gather my thoughts after the long day, I decided to stop into the local McDonalds and have a bite to eat before my meeting. After I ordered I sat down alone, just wanting to be left alone, when a man across from me, who appeared to be an off duty McDonalds employee smiled and said "Smile, life aint that bad." I didn't realize it but I must have looked mad at the world. I still just wanted to be left alone and I avoided eye contact for what seemed like an eternity until my food was done.

As I began to eat, I noticed him looking down at his feet every few seconds, so, as human nature would have it, I eyeballed the floor to see what he was looking at. The man had a pair of shoes that was so tattered and torn, repaired on the sides by what appeared to be glue, that they weren't fit for the trash can, yet he was wearing them to work. With a huge amount of guilt, I looked down at my brand new $30 pair of flip flops and felt sick at my stomach at myself. I tried to ease the feeling as I ate. Soon another couple who came in sat with the man, who continued to happily greet customers even though it was obvious he was off the clock.

I know it isn't polite to eavesdrop, but I was alone and there wasns't alot of sound around me so it was easy to hear the conversation that close to me. He told the man sitting with him that he had been called in to work on his day off at 1 that day and had been off work since 5, and it was nearly 7 p.m. He said "that is four hours more than I would have had." He also went on to tell the couple that he would have to wait for a long while for his dad to pick him up and that he didn't have any time on his prepaid cell phone. The whole time the man continued to make conversation with customers and smile as they came in.

Most people would be irritated to be called into work on such a beautiful day and just plain mad to have to wait for over two hours for a ride to pick them up, but not this man, he was thankful for the hours he was given. In this silent little pity session I was having for myself, I was convinced that I was put in that restaurant for a reason, because I hardly ever eat at McDonalds, and even less when I am alone, in fact now that I think about it, it was the first time I had ever eatten there alone.

This man forced me to think of how thankful I am to not only have nice shoes to work in (because shoes are my largest guilty pleasure in the whole world) but also thankful and blessed to have a good job, a dependable vehicle and a cell phone to call someone if I need to or even if I just want to, not to mention a wonderful loving family.

I am not on a soapbox, but it is so true that we all too often do not see what we have because we are all too busy looking for what we are going to get next.

With a closet chock full of hundreds of pairs of shoes (the main topic of "discussions" between my husband and I), this man put alot of things in perspective for me, but to be honest, if hadn't been the shoes, it may not have sunk in as well and I am pretty sure God knows that. This man forced me to look at myself differently and realize just how truly blessed I really am.

Will I stop buying shoes? Probably not, but at least I will think more when I do buy them and be thankful that I can. I would love to spend some "flip flop money" on this kind young man and buy him a pair of good work shoes, but I would never want him to know who did it, not because I feel sorry for him, but because I envy someone who apparently has so little, yet has such a great attitude for life and is thankful for something like getting called into work.