Kill Them With Kindness

Have you ever heard the idiom “Kill them with kindness”? It essentially means: Show kindness, even to those who you truly dislike. Well, I wanted to share a story with you about a time that I almost killed someone with kindness… More literally than figuratively.

Many years ago I took a girl on a date to see a movie. After the movie she wanted to go to her sister’s house, and I agreed. Once there she introduced me to her sister, brother-in-law and her niece, who was named Madeline.

After our introductions, my date went off with her sister and brother to do whatever it was we came here to do, whereas I was left with Madeline to keep me company. She stood on the other side of the room and shyly looked away from me. It was at this moment that I remembered that I had a bag of Skittles in my pocket that I had purchased at the movie.

I pulled them out and Madeline immediately saw the blue package. I don’t think that she knew what it was, but she clearly knew that it was tasty. She smiled at me and loudly said “Candy!” To this, her mom popped her head into the room and I showed her the bag of Skittles “Can she have some?” I asked. Her mother agreed and I opened the bag. I poured 3 into my hand and put them out for her to take. Madeline ran up to me and one by one picked them up and popped them into her mouth.

With her candies in her mouth she gave me a big smile and started to run in a circle around the room. I watched her for about a minute before she returned with a huge smile on her face and said “Candy!” I poured a few more into my hand and she popped them into her mouth and ran off.

After this, I caught on and it became our own little game. She would run up to me, smile and announce “Candy!” At that point it was my job to pour 3 or 4 pieces into my hand, which she then would take before running around the room and repeating the process.

After we had done this 5 or 6 times I started to just keep the candies in my hand awaiting her arrival. However, as she was coming in for her last grab-and-go she stumbled a bit, then stopped completely. “Are you okay?” I asked. But when she looked up at me her face was red and her eyes were tearing up.  She was overwhelmed with a look of confusion and fear.

(Yeah… at this point all you moms know exactly what was going on…)

I jumped to my feet and said loudly “Madeline?” We looked into each other’s eyes for a moment before I understood… She was choking!

I grabbed her hands and turned her around to give her a few slaps on the back. This didn’t seem to help her at all and she looked up at me with a WTF! look on her face.

Apologizing in my own head I flipped her around and started to perform the Heimlich maneuver on her. After 3 or 4 times she spit up a huge glob of candy. Once I looked at it, I was sure that it was every single Skittle I had given her in the last 10 minutes; she had not even swallowed one.

I turned her around again and looked into her eyes “Madeline! Are you okay?” I said softly. She coughed a few times before looking up at me and pointing to the package of Skittles on the floor and said “Candy!”. I let out a sigh of relief that she was okay and said “No! No more candy for you! What are you, half chipmunk?” It was only then that I looked up and saw my date, her sister and brother-in-law all staring at us.

Madeline’s mother stormed over, picking her up and leaving the room. Her father, on the other hand, laughed a bit. “Ah, she got you with the ol’ candy cache in the cheeks, eh? She does it to me all of the time.” I didn’t really smile back, due to the fact that I felt like the biggest loser there could ever be, and meekly said “must be a guy thing.”

After this I turned to my date and told her I was going to leave. She agreed and I made my way home with this thought in my head:

Lesson learned! That is the last time that I will ever be kind to anyone! … Other than kids that is; they all deserve the chance to stuff their cheeks with enough candy to kill themselves.