Sometimes friendship ends up teaching us things we didn't expect. Most people don't put a price on the compassion, support or assistance they receive, yet we may all underestimate the true value of friends or people that enter our lives, just when we really need someone.

I think back to my days as an au-pair (nanny). I was thankful to stumble on this opportunity to develop a kind of family away from home. They gave me a basement room, board and some great opportunities in exchange for helping care for 6 month old twins and a daughter who was initially a year and a half. The children were a handful, but I learned a lot and made new friends.

 During the first year I lived with them and attended university, the family planned to spend two summer weeks at a cottage in a place called Murray Bay. They went the week before I did. I took a bus with plans to join them. That bus took me a great distance to the ferry dock across from Murray Bay. That evening, the bus had been late, so I missed the last ferry. As a student, I didn't have much money and felt dropped off in the middle of nowhere. The local motel was booked solid. My options seemed limited. I thought of sleeping outside the bus station. Yet, the janitor who worked in the bus station wouldn't hear of that. I was invited home to stay there instead. It was a unique way to meet local strangers, but I thought it made sense at the time. I was grateful for the gesture and shelter, and looking back, I see that janitor as more than a kind soul.

What is it about people we know who seem to know exactly what to say when we're down in the dumps or down on our luck? You may feel that some friends can read your mind or strangers touch your heart. People teach me things in airports, bus stations, on trains, ferries and other unexpected places. I've been welcomed into homes in various countries as part of local custom and in ways that helped me out of “awkward binds”. Not everyone would feel comfortable doing this, but such experiences teach me new sides to hospitality and enrich my life. We always have choices to fear or embrace what happens. For me, people are a gift. What we choose to learn from them adds precious value to our lives.

"Approach each new person you meet in a spirit of adventure. Try to discover what he is thinking and feeling; to understand as far as you can the background from which he comes, the soil in which his roots have grown, the customs and beliefs and ideas which have shaped his thinking." -Elenor Roosevelt