I love sending text jokes. I have been regularly sending all kinds of jokes to my contacts since 1998 (come to think about it, that’s nine straight years, wow!). My contacts are grouped – college friends, high school classmates, family, other relatives, barkada in Angeles, village basketball group, golf buddies, sales force, fellow employees, and many more. The jokes that are sent to each of these groups would depend largely on several factors like their ages, their educational backgrounds, their work, my relation to them, religious orientation, the language they use, etc. There are jokes that fit some groups and there are jokes that fit all groups.
Why did I start doing this (and why do I continue doing this until today)? First, I want to get my money’s worth from the “unlimited” text feature of my cell phone account. Did you know that I send as much as 8,000 to 10,000 text messages per month?! (Sulit di ba?). Second (and more importantly), I love spreading good cheer to everyone – and receiving a joke “from out of the blue” surely brightens one’s day (even for just a moment). It helps provide them with a respite from the rigors of work or the routines of life. I love it when people smile, when people laugh, when they look forward to your next text, when the sight of your name in the heading of incoming message brings about a happy note or cheerful remark. Yes, that’s enough to keep me going.
Raoul, a high school classmate, once remarked during a reunion we had in Quezon City, “Pare, bakit di ka nauubusan ng jokes na pinapadala mo sa akin?” Well, I told him that, for one, none of these jokes are my original creations. All these were sent to me. If a joke made me laugh, I would save it in my joke folder. During my idle time, I would forward these jokes to people I believe would appreciate them. Surprisingly, a great number of them would oblige me with text jokes too! And this is the reason why at any given time, my joke folder would contain at least a hundred unsent jokes – despite the frequency with which I keep forwarding jokes to my contacts.
The touching part is that I know for a fact that a majority of those who send jokes are people who do not have “unlimited texting” – meaning they have to pay at least a peso for every joke they send me. And still, many of them could barely afford it… yet they still do!). I guess the lesson here is that trite saying, “the more you give, the more you receive”. If you go out of your way to make people smile, people would do the same for you.
So go out there and always be a blessing to others… and receive the bountiful blessings of God’s universe that knows how to repay a kind heart!
"So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." (Matthew 6:2-4)
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