You Are Beautiful, Day 28

“For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.”

“Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, it's at the end of your arm, as you get older, remember you have another hand: The first is to help yourself, the second is to help others.” -Audrey Hepburn

For my unexpected last post of this month on beauty, I've chosen to write about a topic that I believe hasn't been touched on yet: service to others. I don't mean this to convey the message that beauty is dependent on utility, because A) it's not, and B) that's cruel and demeaning. What I want to convey is that we spend so much time worrying ourselves- how we look, how we feel, what we want- that we occasionally forget to think about others, when it might be better to forget ourselves instead.

I know so many people who embody this virtuous forgetfulness, and I admire them all (going back to Day 2, beauty = that which we should admire), but I want to focus once more on my friend Quinn. I'd never thought about it or knew it, but Quinn was a prime example of someone who forgot himself in order to serve other people. He was a counselor at several camps helping children overcome challenges or become passionate about their interests, he worked at a nursing home where he was (no surprise) loved by all the residents, he went on marches for all sorts of different causes, and was forever trying to improve the lives of those around him.

In his eulogy, Quinn's mother wrote him a letter in which she told him "You have always been my most selfless child," and remarked that "You are forever emptying your wallet, and mine, and Dad's to give to those in need." When he couldn't give monetarily, he often gave of his time. He spent time in Ecuador (or perhaps Peru, I've forgotten) living with the poorest of the poor and helping them, and a little closer to home, he went on a retreat to an inner city to live like many of the poor residents there. Quinn didn't just want to help people, he wanted to sympathize with them.

If he couldn't do, or simply wasn't doing, those things at a particular time, Quinn was living out those quotes at the top of the post. He tried his best to see the good in all people, even if they'd hurt him. He tried to speak all the good he knew of everybody, and attempted to avoid saying bad things about people if he could. He was peaceful and joyful in his faith, and seemed to know that he was not alone in his walk through life, even when it was difficult. In February of last year, when he was home for a spell, he'd heard that a family friend had been diagnosed with cancer and wasn't faring well, so he wrote the friend a note reminding him/her that God was still watching, and that with time he/she would be able to pull through the treatment.

Quinn was educated by Jesuits for about half of his life, and their unofficial motto is "Men for Others". I think Quinn took that seriously, although as far as I know, he never seriously thought of becoming a priest. Without thinking about himself or calling attention to himself, Quinn went about serving other people to the best of his ability, whether or not he knew them, and almost always in situations where they couldn't pay him back. He did what he did out of genuine love, concern, and kindness, and in so doing made himself a beautiful person. As I wrote in my first post about him, there's a plaque in my kitchen that says "What you are it God's gift to you. What you make of yourself is your gift to God." In nineteen years Quinn made God a  beautiful gift of himself by forgetting himself for the good of others. He was an admirable person, and a beautiful one, too.