For context I am in my early 40s.
When I was 18ish, I was running for a bus. I missed it by the most narrow of margins. (Also, the bus driver was kind of a dick for not sticking around when it was pretty obvious… regardless…)
As it just so happened, there was a taxi a couple cars behind that bus that saw me running for it and it driving away.
That taxi driver waved me in with nary a word, drove me a stop or two in front of the bus, and without charging me, dropped me off so I could catch the bus. (To be clear this was in an area where the bus route was LONG and the taxi driver obviously knew it’d be an hour or so before the next one.)
Ever since that day, for over two decades now, that random act of kindness has stuck in my mind. We literally never said a word beyond my panicked “THANKS” as I ran out at the end. No names, nothing, just wild gesticulations and gratitude.
Love to hear some more.
on my first day of living in new york; i was carrying my worldly possessions in a trio of jumbo suitcases and i was having difficulty carrying them up the subway stairs to the street and blocking the path for everyone else. two people – wordlessly and zero eye contact – each took a suitcase out of my hand and carried it up to the top of the stairs, dropped them off where i can resume rolling them and walked away.
not a single “let me help you” or “do you need some help?”; they saw the situation and decided that helping me would help everyone else and simply did it.
this was before smartphones became a thing so i doubt that this could still happen because people’s faces are too buried in screens to notice others anymore.
i still see people help others with heavy/unwieldy loads up the subway stairs though. especially if they’re in the way lol