Giving Thanks On Thanksgiving For A Year Of Good Turns

A look back at our first year of celebrating kindness

When we published this introductory post on the blog a year ago today we had no idea how much fun (or how much work) it would be to tell the story of a good turn every week. But in the year since then, we’ve learned: it’s a ton of fun, and a ton of work, and it’s totally worth it. The reaction we get when people read of even just hear about the Good Turns blog is universally positive: everyone seems to believe that what the world really needs is more good news, and we are overjoyed to be able to bring just that to you.

Overjoyed, and grateful. Today is Thanksgiving day, a day on which, in America, we pause to reflect on the gifts we’ve been given, and, if we can, extend a helping hand to those who have less. This may happen in the smallest of ways—a door held open, a bus seat offered, a friendly smile directed toward a passer-by—or it may happen in the grandest. We’ve written about all of them over the last 12 months. If you’ve only recently discovered the blog, here are a few of our favorites:

Our first good turn was about a man who brings free donuts to retail workers every Black Friday—followed up a year later by his latest charitable foray into delivering deep-fried dough

Last December, we learned that restaurant patrons really do leave life-changing tips that enable people to pursue their dreams

In June we saw that a smaller gratuity can be enough to send someone off with a warmer heart

Some of the best good turns are done by people who never make themselves known

An art auction gave one woman the opportunity to do a good turn that helped salvage a legacy

Helping maintain the memory of one who passed on was the occasion for another unusual good turn

One creative good turn came out of a San Francisco design and creative agency

Sometimes the simple good turns are the most memorable

Even teenagers can lend a helping hand

And sometimes it’s just enough to do what you can do

We’ve really enjoyed putting together these and all the other good turns we’ve featured over the last year, and we’re looking forward to our next year of celebrating kindness and the everyday heroes who do one another such amazing good turns. We’re also really grateful to you, dear reader, and we hope you’ve been inspired, in some small way, to make good turns (and Good Turns) a bigger part of your life this past year—or that reading these stories has given you at least a fraction of the joy we’ve gotten out of writing them.

And remember you can always drop us a line if you think you have a good story for the blog. We look forward to hearing from you. And we’ll see you next week as we start into our second year of good turns and gratitude. In the meantime… Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted November 23, 2017