Negativity and selfishness gets great publicity in our social networking, indirect-contact society. You’d be led to believe the world’s running low on good people and that no one cares for or respects one another anymore. Their only concerns are themselves; and when they’re in need, no one is willing to lend them a hand without reward.
This is not the case. Kind, caring, selflessly-generous people still exist. Nadia Washington is a shining example.
Washington is a renowned singer, songwriter, musician, and professor at Berklee College of Music – both their Ear Training and Voice Department and Global Jazz Institute. The Houston native has proven throughout her acclaimed career that she finds harmony in assisting others.
Lalah Hathaway, George Duke and Esperanza Spalding are on the list of artists grateful for Washington’s generous notes. She was famously a background singer and writer on Dianne Reeves’ album Beautiful Life which won a Grammy for Best Jazz Vocals. While good at what she does, she’s also a good person and one who believes in helping others.
I asked Nadia Washington to tell me about a time when she did something nice for someone she didn’t know. Here’s what she shared.
“I was on a plane headed to L.A., I was going out there to do some clinics with Miami Jazz Festival. I’d gotten comfortable in my seat, minding my own business, and there was this much older lady that sat next to me. She reminded me of my great-grandmother who passed [away]. I didn’t strike up a conversation or anything. I just smiled and nodded. Eventually she spoke to me.
She asked me my name and I told her. Then she told me hers. And then she said that I was really pretty! She asked, ‘How old are you? Do you have a boyfriend? Are you married? Do you have children?’ And I’m like, ‘Well, no…’
During our conversation she told me she was married once but her husband passed away. I asked her why she didn’t find a new husband and she just chuckled and laughed! We just had, like, a girl-talk.
She told me she was on her way to L.A. to visit her son and that she was from a region in India. She asked me if I was Muslim because my name was popular in the Muslim/Islam community. I told her I was Christian but I respected Muslims. Those are our brothers. She smiled.
So then she pulled out a little mandarin orange, started to peel it, and then offered me a slice. And I took it! At that point we’d really become friends on that flight, so I shared her snack with her. She said, ‘I really like you! I want you to meet my family.’ And I was like, ‘Okay!’
By the time the flight ended I realized she didn’t have a phone and she asked me to call her son to let him know she was there. And since she was older, and disabled somewhat, they had a wheelchair waiting for her. But she decided not to take it because I said I’d walk with her. I walked her all the way to baggage claim and helped her get her luggage and waited until her son found her.
He said, ‘Thank you so much for helping her.’ And she was still talking about wanting me to come with her and meet the rest of her family!
And I just thought that was such a sweet encounter about respecting a different generation, your elders. Understanding that despite religious differences we can still be friends, we can still cohabitate and have something in common and be there for one another.
[Donald] Trump talked about putting up walls, putting up barriers between us and between cultures. It’s really disheartening and saddening.
We’re all humans. We all smile and laugh. We can interact with one another in a civil and friendly manner.” |THIS.
[By Mr. Joe Walker]
“We are the ones who make a brighter day, so let’s start giving.” – ‘We Are the World’
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