I’ve really started to dread election years.

Many of the stories out there right now are focused on the Presidential campaign (as they should be in an election year), but I find them very hard to swallow. I’m so tired of the negative political tactics that are being reported. Many are— at the very least— mean-spirited… and at the very most, just plain wrong.

In any case, this is why there has been yet another delay. I start out looking for good news, but soon find myself completely overwhelmed by the negative news. So I had to go on a news “break” of sorts.

Found one today though. A really good one that made me smile.

And I’ve just decided that I need to steel myself— and keep digging until I find a gem underneath all of the trash. I think we could all use an extra boost right now.

And speaking of boosts…. 😉

Thomas Weller of San Diego is a mechanic by trade… and a philanthropist at heart. Over the years, he’s used his mechanical skills to pay forward a favor he received almost forty years ago.

That’s when he plowed his car into a snow bank in Illinois, and a stranger stopped to help him.

“I probably would have froze there if this fellow hadn’t stopped to help me,” he told a reporter with CBS News.

That good Samaritan told Weller that all he needed to do to return the favor, was to help someone else in need at some point.

Weller paid off the debt in a huge way.

He now travels around San Diego’s freeways on a regular basis, searching for people who need roadside assistance. He does everything from changing tires to repairing overheated engines.

So far, he’s helped about 5,000 people. Enough to start his own American Automobile Association chapter– if he wanted to. 😉

Except, “this is way better than AAA,” one woman he helped said.

Whenever he’s asked why he does it, he simply hands the person a card.

One fortunate “customer” read it out loud to a reporter. “It says, ‘Assisting you has been my pleasure. I ask no payment other than for you to pass on the favor by helping someone in distress that you may encounter.'”

After handing over his card and accepting a multitude of thanks, Weller moves on to the next person in need, never questioning whether others will indeed pay the favor forward.

He knows that they do.

Once he stopped to help someone in distress, but found that someone else had beaten him to it. Weller asked the man why he had stopped.

“He said four months earlier his wife had had a blow out on the freeway – and somebody stopped to help her,” Weller said.

“And he said, ‘By the way, thank you for doing that for my wife.'”

As if that isn’t enough reason to continue his acts of kindness, Weller admits that he does have another underlying motive for doing what he does.

He says, “There’s too much anger and distrust and fear out there. I’d like the world to be a better place.”