I am a people pleaser. It’s one of my worst traits. I don’t care what people think about me, but I want them to like me. As such, I’ve spent a lot of time working on being kind not only to others, but also to myself. A hard lesson I learned was that no matter what you do, some people just aren’t going to like you.
However, one of my more positive traits is that I’m a helper. I have helped many people move in and out of apartments, I’ve given rides to and from doctor’s appointments, the airport, and the hospital, and I’ve done a lot of heavy lifting and manual labor for free.
I say all this not to gain sympathy or admiration or really any sort of recognition – it is just to help you understand who I am as a person. I want people to like me to a fault, and I will often go out of my way and do lots of things most other people wouldn’t do in order to get there. It’s a double-edged sword; sometimes, I’m so busy helping others that I forget to look after my own needs.
That being said, I started doing something about 10 or so years ago that I want to explain more in-depth.
It was probably 7 or so on a week night, I didn’t have class at UNF until later in the next day, and I was bored. I was living at home with my parents a) to save money on room and board and b) because I was not a functioning human on my own yet and needed their guidance. So in a classic son fashion, I said to my angelic mother, “Mom, I’m bored. What should I do?” Her answer changed how I view the world in a rather profound way. I don’t think she understands how much her suggestion has done, but it was a good one. My mother is a saint. She said, “Y’know, [insert member of our local congregation’s name here] has been having a rough week. Why don’t you go buy some dollar ice cream sundaes from McDonald’s and bring them by? That would cheer her up a lot.”
So I did it. Sadly, the golden arches do not sell ice cream sundaes for a dollar any more, but it was a great deal. 5 or 6 hot fudge sundaes for no more than 6 bucks with tax? Sign me up.
I fired up the ’95 Camry with 3 missing door handles, went to the Mickey D’s down the road from my house, put in my order, didn’t get turned down by the ice cream machine being broke, and drove the 10 or 15 minutes to this person’s house.
I got out of the car, knocked on the door, and said something like, “I heard you were having a tough week so I brought you and your family some ice cream.”
The look on this person’s face made my whole week. I have attempted to recapture that feeling countless times, and the only time it ever comes close is when I open Nate Livsey’s Fresh-Baked Cookie Delivery Service every once in a while on Facebook.
I quickly realized as a 20 year-old college student with no money and poor fiscal awareness that spending money on ice cream to make people happy would not work in the long term. So I turned to cookies. Buying a tube of cookie dough is rather easy. Directions are on the wrapper, all you need is some parchment paper and a working oven. However, I soon realized that store-bought cookie dough just doesn’t taste as good as handmade-with-love cookie dough. Thus, I started to learn how to bake cookies.
I also wanted to spread joy and happiness through my cookies, and I figured the best way to do so would be to drive and deliver cookies to people who were having a bad day or just needed a pick-me-up. In true millennial fashion, I figured the best way to do that would be to put a call out on Facebook. So I did that.
And I kept doing it.
Over and over and over again.
Granted, it wasn’t anything consistent – maybe once or twice every 2 or 3 months, sometimes with longer intervals between. But one thing was consistent – the joy it brought to people. I have seen so many frowns turn upside down, so many eyes light up with joy, and so many squeals of happiness just from seeing cookies it could make the most cynical individual have some hope. And that makes me happy.
And so, even though my deliveries of cookies aren’t completely altruistic and are admittedly self-serving in some ways, it is my way of bringing a little bit of light into an otherwise dreary and depressing world. In the inimitable words of the Barefoot Contessa,
You can be miserable before you have a cookie and you can be miserable after you eat a cookie, but you can’t be miserable while you are eating a cookie.
Ina Garten
Do more people need to bake and deliver cookies? No, probably not. Do more people need to do just one thing to brighten someone’s day? No, they don’t have to, but I submit that doing so would make both your life and the lives of those around you much better.
Nate Livsey 