After my 25-year old son’s fatal car crash, I became obsessed with how to honor Lucas. I wanted some kind of tradition, something meaningful, to remember him by. As a society we have really no road map for how to proceed. I made several calls about planting a tree, installing a bench. But I wanted something …everyday. A way to reach people like him…to put a smile on someone’s face. He was a barefoot boy. Growing up since age 7 in the tropical climes of South Florida and Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, you couldn’t get shoes on him! He would kick them off, abandon them at the first opportunity. As soon as he was old enough to choose, he chose barefoot. That is, when he wasn’t wearing his beloved basketball shoes (Nothing like the sound of squeaky shoes on polished wood floor gymnasiums.) He went to college in flip flops, played sports barefoot, even climbed the highest mountain in Vermont (Mt. Mansfield) barefoot!
On the first painful birthday celebration after his death, friends and family gathered at Oleta State Park where he had worked. I don’t know why, but I showed up with an extra pair of flip flops. I had bought them on auto-pilot while shopping one day. I told a close friend, ‘I brought these flip flops in Luke’s size’ (size 11) ‘I don’t know what I was thinking!’ She said ‘I brought some, too.’ We compared them. Without each other’s knowledge we had each bought Size 11 flip flops. In the Same Colors: black, red and gray. Some time between breaking out the brownies while singing Happy Birthday and the roaring campfire, we decided to randomly leave the flip flops, one pair on the beach and another on a cabin porch. Luke’s best friend’s mom suggested we add a note: ‘a gift from Lucas’.
Thus the tradition was born. Friends and family leaving flip flops in various sizes and colors, in random places, all over the world. Ideally in June, near his birthday; but random acts of kindness know no boundaries. Along the way, my wonderful friends at Winning Image Graphics in Vermont desigxned a beautiful logo for our Flip Flop Drop, reminding recipients to Flip It Forward.
Last summer, during a particularly cold spell in Vermont, I decided to add socks (a Sock Drop!) and even PJ’s, always with the idea of surprising unsuspecting recipients. So when a friend and I drove cross-country in the fall, I thought, what better time to continue the Flip Flop and Sock Drop tradition?! We could reach so many new people and places! From Saratoga to Syracuse to Seneca Nation, from Cleveland to Columbus, from Louisville to Nashville, and Davenport and Gulfport, and innumberable places in between, flops and socks and more were dropped, tolls paid, coffees and beers and meals purchased, basically random acts of kindness ‘spreading smiles’.
Thank you to all of the people who got onboard and became kindness angels… Every little act of kindness creates ripples that go on forever. Let’s keep doing what we can to keep kindness alive. And, if you were a lucky recipient of a random act of kindness whether from Luke’s Flip Flop Drop or whatever, please share a sentence or two about your find, and we would love to see photos!!