I  have a very vivid image in my brain from my childhood –  we are at the carnival at the Days of ’76 in Deadwood SD (probably early 1960’s), my grandpa has been given tickets for the carnival rides and my brother and sister and I have had all the fun we could possibly have (or as much fun as our parents thought we should have), and grandpa still has a bunch of free tickets in his pocket. He doesn’t want them to go to waste so he starts passing them out to other children as we make our way toward the car. There are screeches of delight at the unexpected gifts handed out along the way and the kids of Deadwood are off for more fun. I know that this was not the most generous act I’ve ever witnessed as he got the tickets for free or at a discount, but the thing that stays with me is how much he enjoyed making those random, unknown kids so happy.  I remember looking back at him strolling through the crowd, almost glowing, with the most beautiful smile on his face. I’ve never forgotten that.

I come from a not-wealthy background – my grandparents were first generation immigrants and  farmers, the Norwegian side in Iowa and the German side in North Dakota and MN. My Grandma Hammer never learned to drive, made her own laundry soap, didn’t have a clothes dryer until their children gave them one for their 50th wedding anniversary. (And she STILL hung clothes outside after grandpa shoveled a path to the clothesline for her.) With an 8th grade education, Grandpa Hammer became the head machinist at Homestake Gold Mine. They also became quite wealthy, because my grandpa invested in the stock market and then re-invested any dividends he earned, and they never spent much money. As children we were never aware of their monetary wealth. They lived modestly in a small house my grandpa built, and never threw anything away until it had been well-used and then re-used and then re-purposed again. One of the first words that would come up when describing them was that they were so generous – but generous with everything they had, especially their time, actions, and attention.

This has made me wonder about generosity. It seems to be a tough thing to pin down – in fact, the first definition I found online is that generosity is the act of being generous. OK… whatever that means.  Obviously, generosity means something different to everyone – and we can be generous in a variety of ways - thoughts, words, money, time, things, influence, and attention. But as I remember Grandpa giving free ride tickets away, it was his complete and total enjoyment of the act that I remember most. It makes me think that giving to others has to be tied to loving others. Without love, I feel even the biggest acts of generosity are meaningless and maybe a little hollow. The smallest acts of kindness and generosity are huge (for both the receiver AND the giver) when done out of love.

Joy Miller