Cascading Consequences

Have you ever tried to skip a rock on water? If you choose a small, flat stone carefully and throw it so that it strikes the water parallel to the surface, it can skip six or seven times before it finally loses momentum and sinks. But skipping creates many overlapping ripples that spread out from each bounce of the rock. Soon however, the water settles down and the ripples disappear. The things we do or say are somewhat like this, but here the metaphor breaks down. Often what we do or say remains in the hearts and minds of those around us for many years, even a lifetime. It may even be passed on to future generations. Even though they are not seen, the effect of the ripples is immeasurable, especially with social media – consequences can cascade far beyond our ability to control or manage them.

Shortly after World War II, my father moved my mother and me to Virgin, Utah to live in my Grandfather Cornelius’ home. It was the largest house in town, two-story red brick with plenty of room for the three of us. My mother and Audrey Reusch (a close neighbor) quickly became fast friends, and it was only natural that I made friends with their oldest son, Dickie.

My friend and I (we were 5 or 6 years old at the time) had seen several chickens have their heads removed on the chopping block in the barnyard of my Grandmother Emma’s farm in Virgin, Utah. We decided to catch a chicken and try it ourselves. We caught one and with the hatchet that was still buried in the wood block, proceeded to do nothing but mutilate the poor chicken.

My grandmother saw us and came running. She put the bird out of its misery and chastised us roundly. She then hurried inside the house with the bird, scalded it, and removed the feathers. We ate it for dinner.

What Dickie and I didn’t know was that it was one of her neighbor’s prize chickens, a rare specimen of which the neighbor was very proud. A chicken was a chicken, as far as we were concerned. Grandmother’s neighbor came around looking for the chicken a few days later, but grandma was too embarrassed to rat us out. She said she had not seen the chicken. The point of this story from my childhood is this: We often cannot predict the consequences of our acts, both good and bad.

Dickie and I put my grandmother between a rock and a hard place. If she told the truth, her neighbor would probably have been furious at both her and us. So she lied. My grandmother was as honest as the day is long, but she lied. Her embarrassment and her desire to protect us forced her to do something that she normally would not have done. Furthermore, she destroyed the evidence by scalding, plucking, and cooking the chicken. All chickens do look pretty much alike without feathers.

My mother, and probably my father, and perhaps my grandfather, certainly knew the story. They said nothing to the neighbor about the chicken’s demise and eventual consumption. I had actually forgotten about this incident until my mother refreshed my memory some years ago.  I have thought many times about it since then and the effect it had on others. Regardless of our denials, what we do always affects others. Now I have posted this story on the internet. This blog is read in 72 countries (and counting) by many people from different walks of life. Who knows where it will go from here?

I first published the following story in the September 2014 post entitled Random Acts of Kindness. I publish it again in the context of this post to support the concept of “Cascading Consequences.”

President Kimball’s classic and inspiring story about the woman at the airport has been told and retold. It’s the perfect example of cascading consequences. This version has been taken from the January 2007 Ensign Article titled: Spencer W. Kimball: Man of Action, by Garrett H. Garff. See also Teachings of Presidents of the Church, pp79–80.

Stranded in an airport because of bad weather, a young mother and her two-year-old daughter had been waiting in long lines for hours trying to get a flight home. The child was tired and fussy, but the mother, who was pregnant and at risk of miscarriage, did not pick her up. A doctor had advised the mother to avoid lifting the two-year-old unless absolutely necessary. The woman overheard disapproving comments from people around her as she used her foot to slide her crying daughter along in the line. Nobody offered to help. But then, the woman later recalled, “someone came towards us and with a kindly smile said, ‘Is there something I could do to help you?’ With a grateful sigh I accepted his offer. He lifted my sobbing little daughter from the cold floor and lovingly held her to him while he patted her gently on the back. He asked if she could chew a piece of gum. When she was settled down, he carried her with him and said something kindly to the others in the line ahead of me, about how I needed their help. They seemed to agree and then he went up to the ticket counter [at the front of the line] and made arrangements with the clerk for me to be put on a flight leaving shortly. He walked with us to a bench, where we chatted a moment, until he was assured that I would be fine. He went on his way. About a week later I saw a picture of Apostle Spencer W. Kimball and recognized him as the stranger in the airport.”

President Kimball never introduced himself. He wanted nothing, not even recognition, for the service he rendered. He just wanted to help. Were it not for the exhausted woman he helped, the story would have never been told, and perhaps the sequel below would not have been written.

Several years later, President Kimball received a letter (as chronicled in an article by President Gordon B. Hinckley, “Do Ye Even So to Them,” Ensign, Dec. 1991), that read, in part:

“Dear President Kimball:

“I am a student at Brigham Young University. I have just returned from my mission in Munich, West Germany. I had a lovely mission and learned much.

“I was sitting in priesthood meeting last week, when a story was told of a loving service which you performed some twenty-one years ago in the Chicago airport. The story told of how you met a young pregnant mother with a … screaming child, in … distress, waiting in a long line for her tickets. She was threatening miscarriage and therefore couldn’t lift her child to comfort her. She had experienced four previous miscarriages, which gave added reason for the doctor’s orders not to bend or lift.

“You comforted the crying child and explained the dilemma to the other passengers in line. This act of love took the strain and tension off my mother. I was born a few months later in Flint, Michigan.

“I just want to thank you for your love. Thank you for your example!”

We now have record of a young man who has received his endowment, served a mission in West Germany, and affected the lives of many people there, perhaps even converted some to the gospel because of a selfless act.. Although he doesn’t say so, the young man could have gone on to marriage and sealing in the temple of the Lord. His wife and children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, and so on into the future will have the benefit of the gospel in their lives. Exodus 20:5-6 reads, in part:

…for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

However, we can break that cycle at any time. The Lord will be merciful to those who choose to love him, regardless of what their fathers did. If that scripture is true (and it is), the converse is also true. To paraphrase, “…for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the obedience of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that love me.”

Cascading consequences. Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin, in his book, Finding Peace in Our Lives, teaches us this:

The responsibility that no person can escape is that of wielding a personal influence. Daily words and actions influence the entire world. We each carry an atmosphere that radiates from us and that in some manner or degree affects others. We cannot escape it. We must so live our lives that we set the proper example to those about us. We are each a light, and it is our duty not to have that light hidden under a bushel, but to set it upon a hill, that all persons may be guided by it.  The Lord has commanded us in these latter days: "Arise and shine forth, that thy light may be a standard for the nations." ("D&C 115:5D&C 115:5.)