I work at a toy store, and, as you’d expect, I interact with a /lot/ of kids. I’m usually manning the register, and am usually a kid’s first “spending their own money” experience, so I tend to up my patience/friendliness just for these instances.  

One day, I check out a little boy who is around five or six. I had answered a boatload of questions for him while he shopped; once I gave him his change, he plucked out a quarter and slid it across the counter.

Boy: “And that… is for you.”

Me: “Oh, no, bud, this is your change! You get to keep it!”

He threw his hands up and stepped back from the counter.

Boy: “No, it’s yours! I’m tipping you! Mom, I’m tipping her!”

Mom shrugs apologetically at me.

Me: “Are you absolutely sure? You can put this towards your next visit.”

He started to walk towards the door and called back over his shoulder.

Boy: “You’re welcome!”

It was the best gumball of my career.

I’d been having a bad day, and I had ridden with my daughter to the store. I’d finished my shopping and was sitting on a bench by the registers waiting for her to check out, and while I was waiting, I was coloring a picture of a dragon on a color-by-number app on my phone. I glanced up as a young boy, I’d guess to be four or five, approached me. I have a large facial birthmark and it’s not unusual for youngsters to ask about it, so that’s what I was expecting.

Boy: “Whatcha doing?”

Me: *Turning my phone so he can see* “Coloring. Do you want to see?”

Boy: “Oh, a dragon! But it’s not real, you know.”

Me: “I know, it’s a drawing of what someone thought one would look like if it was.”

Boy: “But it’s wrong; dragons aren’t blue!”

Me: “Oh, they aren’t? I didn’t know that! What color are dragons?”

Boy: “Red and green, and they have fire coming out of their mouths.”

Me: “Okay, I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks for the correction!”

Boy: “You know, I have one of those.” *Points to my face* “It’s right here!”

He lifted his shirt to show me a red mark on his belly.

Boy: “My mama says it’s a birthmark. I really like yours; it’s pretty!”

The woman he was with — I assume his mother — who was checking out at the closest register to where I was sitting, came to collect him and apologized for him bothering me. I assured her that he was not bothering me — in fact, he was quite delightful — and thanked her for sharing him with me for a moment.

It still wasn’t my best day, but I was still smiling a few minutes later when my daughter came to collect me.

I work at a grocery store that has a by-the-pound premade food bar.

Our store was recently renovated, and we got a new employee handwashing station at the hot bar. The old station was just a metal sink with very hot water. The new one has two holes into which you insert your hands, and you hold still while they spray you very hard with very hot water full of disinfecting chemicals. The spray nozzles move around the inside of the holes as they spray. They leave your hands smelling vaguely of lemon.

Even though employee handwashing sinks are not supposed to be available to the public, for some reason, the new handwashing station was installed in such a way that customers have access to it. Perhaps this is considered acceptable because we still have a standard hot-water sink in the employee area behind the hot bar.

There’s a pictographic sign on the station that explains how to use them.

A little kid, maybe eight years of age, noticed our handwashing station. He dragged a box of product in front of it to stand on, stuck his hands in, and went, “Wheeee!” while the water spun. Once it stopped, he removed his hands… and then inserted them again. He just sorta… kept doing this.

Now, having a customer stand on a box of product? Not a good thing. But I didn’t want to kick him off of the handwashing station, because he was clearly having fun. I got a step stool from the back and traded him for the box of product.

When he finally went home with an older girl that might have been his sister, I decided I was feeling too lazy to put the step stool away, and it looked like it belonged there. I also had a feeling that the kid was going to be back.

Sure enough, the next day, he was back, obsessively sticking his hands into the hole and letting it spray him.

Ever since that kid discovered our handwashing device, he’s been by almost every day — some days multiple times a day — just to stick his hands into it and get sprayed. He’s become a regular in the store. His stool still sits there next to the handwashing station.

I guess a part of me wishes I could still take so much pleasure in such a simple thing.

CONTENT WARNING: Fatal Car Accident

My wife and I are raising my ten-year-old son, my eight-year-old niece, and my seven-year-old daughter. We adopted my niece more than a year ago. My sister was a single mother, and my niece, sister, and her boyfriend were in a car accident caused by a drunk driver. My sister and her boyfriend both died.

My niece survived but was paralyzed from her lower back down, and she had to come to terms with her mom’s death, adjust to living in our family, and learn how to live her new life in a wheelchair.

At first, we were worried about how our kids would react to their cousin living with us. She wasn’t close to us before; the reason we were adopting her was that she didn’t have anywhere else to go. Our kids had met her a few times before. Due to the hospital’s health crisis regulations at the time, the only visitors allowed in the hospital she was staying at were adults, and they really preferred that those adults were my wife and me. We tried to have the kids talk on Zoom, but they never really connected. My son in particular can be very resistant to any changes at home and was pretty upset already about the ways we were changing our house to make it more accessible.

We brought my niece home after a few months in the hospital, and as expected, my son wasn’t incredibly happy about this. He didn’t say anything to her face about it, but she could tell he wasn’t happy about her being there.

The next morning, I woke up at seven, and as I went into the kitchen to start making breakfast, I saw my niece’s wheelchair… but no niece in it. I heard strange noises coming from the living room, and I walked in to see my son with my niece sitting on his shoulders, my niece being very small for her age. They were both giggling and laughing and searching for something on the mantle above the fireplace.

I got my niece back into her wheelchair and asked what happened. All that they would tell me was that my niece’s glasses had somehow ended up on the mantel. My son was too short to see it from where he was standing, and my niece was too nearsighted to find her glasses without wearing them, so they were just doing their best to work together to find the glasses.

I was upset that my son had just picked her up and put her on his shoulders, and we had a long talk about safety, but I’m also incredibly relieved; it’s been six months, and my son, niece, and daughter are best friends. I asked my son what changed, and he just said that it was impossible to stay mad at his cousin when she’s such an amazing person.

Both of my kids are very patient and supportive of my niece’s trauma, anxiety, and physical disability, and my niece is incredibly loving and grateful in return.

This story is part of our Highest-Voted-Inspirational-Stories-Of-2023-(so far!) roundup!

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Read the Highest-Voted-Inspirational-Stories-Of-2023-(so far!) roundup!

I am stocking shelves when an adorable little toddler waddles up to me, points, and calls me “Daddy.” Their apologetic mother is a few steps behind, successfully scooping up her little escape artist.

Mother: “Sorry about that. She’s learning to speak.”

I am tall but obviously present as female.

Me: “Do… I look like her father?”

Mother: “Oh, no! Actually, we thought she’s been calling all adult women ‘Mama’ and all adult men ‘Daddy’, but there must be something else to it if she called you ‘Daddy’. Anyway, sorry about that!”

She carried off the burbling little person, and I smiled it off and continued my duties.

A few years later, I figure that little lady was on to something, as I started my transition to finally present as the man I have always felt like inside! Validation from kids is the best kind of validation!