I had a better day yesterday and so far today.  The kindness of strangers at the retail store I work at really does affect me positively.  I received a lot of positive reinforcement from customers smiling and thanking me for taking the extra care to help them.  Quite an epiphany for me because that is how I have always tried to live my life, spreading the smallest amount of happiness to strangers whenever possible, stopping to hold the door for them, a smile, have a good day, etc.  I suppose it comes from my upbringing, which was the opposite of all of the above.  My mother was the person who always made it a point in life to tell people the way it was.  I vividly remember, I was probably about 5 years old, standing in line at McDonalds, my mother thought another customer cut in line in front of us, probably by accident or her misconception.  She decided to tell them what a piece of s**t they were. . . I don't remember her exact words, but I remember hanging my head to hide my face, praying to be invisible, taking my younger brother's hand and tugging at him to go with me to take a few steps away from her in hopes no one would know we were with her.  How horrible for a child to remember their mother like this, never kind, just angry at anyone and everyone, including me.  I suppose that was how I had to learn, to always do the opposite of what my mother would do, unfortunately, I received my depression and bipolar disorder from her.  It was and still is the hardest thing to know that a piece of her is in me. . . just devastating to me to know a part of me is like her.