Community blessed by random acts of kindness

It blows my mind that it has been two weeks since Hurricane Matthew because, to me, at least, one day blurs into another.

Have I been fishing? Other than taking 10 minutes to pitch a jig for redfish and another hour to go shrimping with my friend Will Thompson, all I have done is to try to help folks that took major hits in the storm. Starting early in the morning, I knock on people’s doors and ask them if I can help. I’m no martyr, but I do it for one reason only. When I get home late in the day tired and hurting, those minor inconveniences pale in comparison to the high I get from helping people.

I credit my folks for teaching me to perform random acts of kindness and, if I had to choose one thing that they instilled in me that I am most proud of, this wins hands down.

Unlike after Hurricane Hugo, when I took pretty much an entire year off raising money so I could build homes for deserving individuals that had lost everything, the 27 years that have since passed have stolen a bit of my then-youthful enthusiasm. Physically, I can’t do a lot of the things I would like but, because of great friends — younger friends — many projects were accomplished.

One of my regular fishing buddies, Dan Cornell, whose house I stayed in during Matthew, showed up two days after the storm. Along with a group of guys from Wexford Plantation that included Johnathan Jarrell, Jason Bullock, Steve Hall and David Neuman, they went on a tear chainsawing from dawn until dusk from one end of Hilton Head to the other.

For real? I was astounded because, for instance, Dan is a banker, not an everyday laborer, as was the case with most all these guys.

Another selfless individual that went way above and beyond was Robert “Moose” Rini. In his case, he should have been a magician because when jobs seemed impossible, he was always pulling rabbits out of a hat, making completing tasks possible.

When I reached a point facing trees that were bigger around than an elephant, I called an old friend of mine, Dennis Rauch, who used to live next door to me before moving to Tybee Island. The owner of Haden Marine Construction, he had heavy equipment and, though his own house was flooded, he agreed to bring over some of his equipment and help me out.

I had heard of so many people getting gouged, Dennis was a breath of fresh air. I won’t go into a lot of detail about all the jobs we handled except one case, that being the Waddell Mariculture Center that had lots of huge trees down.

Meeting up with Al Stokes, Dennis only charged the center the cost of his employees to take down and clean up downed trees that would have cost many thousands of dollars had a tree company done the work.

I will you this — after a disaster, it doesn’t take long to determine those that are selfless along with those that are true friends. Even the other day, I was sitting down at my computer for the first time trying to get caught up on work, bills and such, and outside I heard all manner of racket going on. Chainsaws, blowers, yelling and, after nearly an hour of this, I decided to go out and see what was going on.

Turning the corner, I see nearly 30 people in bright orange shirts cleaning my next-door neighbor’s yard. I knew my neighbors were at work, so I was perplexed as to who these folks were. It was a group called “Samaritan’s Purse.” After chatting with them for a bit, I learned they were church affiliated and were randomly stopping at homes affected by the storm, clearing away debris.

Amazingly, many of the group were over 50 years old and even those folks were handling chain saws and lugging away monster chunks of wood to refuse piles. It really touched me.

I have always tried to perform at least one random act of kindness a day, and to see these people doing the same insured them GPs.

What are GPs? I made that up years back and it stands for God Points.

Finally, for anyone wondering about the Collin Stokes Memorial Inshore Fishing Tournament that was supposed to have been held last weekend, hopefully you got the message that it was postponed. They do plan on rescheduling it very soon. Right now, the problem still remains that many of those that planned to fish still have problems with all the docks that are missing, along with simply trying to put their lives back to normal.

I will let you all know the new date and hope that you take a break from all this and participate. The Waddell Mariculture Center needs your help now more than ever. One thing I can guarantee is should you fish this tournament, GPs are pretty much guaranteed!

Good luck and God bless.

This story was originally published October 22, 2016 at 6:06 PM with the headline "Community blessed by random acts of kindness."