Today my mother, who is 55, fell while she was at our local public library. She came home afterwards and came upstairs into my room to tell me that something happened to her. She burst into tears telling me that she fell and some high school boys started laughing at her. I held her in my arms and told her she didn’t deserve that, and that they were just immature young boys.

The truth is, I was heartbroken and disgusted upon hearing this. This just shows how easy it is to bring someone down, and to ruin their day. My sweet Mom didn’t deserve to be laughed at. She has Parkinsons disease and sometimes loses balance and trips. When those boys laughed at her, they brought all her insecurities about her disability to the surface. They made her feel old and insignificant. No person deserves that.

A little bit of kindness can go along way, and so can disrespect and hurtful comments and actions. I hope that people read this, and realize how their actions can affect others.