Hug a Stranger Day

Have you ever been going along in your day and received a random hug from a stranger? I have not, but I've gotten the opportunity to see it happen quite frequently.

Before I explain... a question: If a random person came up and hugged you how would you respond?

Marinn has the market cornered on hugging random strangers and Taurin is following close behind.  I'm not quite sure where this came from (I'm really not one for hugging strangers) but I've come to enjoy peoples responses.

Marinn hugged an old lady at the Hope Mills park one day.  The lady was just walking across the grass and Marinn went out of her way, ran over and hugged the lady.  The ladies face lit up and said, "HI! Do you want to come home with me?" then she put out her hand for Marinn to hold. Marinn took her and like sure sounds good to me. (Obviously this is the point where I told Marinn she needed to stay with Mommy).  The lady looked truly happy and grateful to have gotten a hug from my cute kid.

I haven't noticed a pattern of her random stranger hugging... she never targets the same demographic but I have observed that there is zero interaction with the person prior to the hug.  It's like she's sneaking up on people who haven't noticed her so she can really catch them by surprise.

Just Tuesday we were at the park and she was playing on the toys and out of no where just hugged a random mom on a bench.

Some people hug her right back like they really needed a hug that day... others awkwardly hug her back... others look around like they are seeing if someone is watching. It makes me wonder why she chooses the people she does... like she just senses that they needed a hug or something or she is just being silly and thinks it's fun, or maybe she wanted a hug and so she just grabbed the closest persons she could find.

Taurin has joined her in interacting with strangers... we were at the park and Toto just went and sat down in a ladies lap.  Now the lady had a bag of bread and I think Taurin was just trying to scam some bread off of her but it was funny either way.  The lady was really nice and actually gave Toto 3 mini loaves of bread because it was moldy and for the ducks... so she showed her where the ducks were. Marinn got in on feeding the ducks too and they were all super excited.

Marinn doesn't limit her hugging and affection to adults... she loves meeting new kids. She'll invade their personal space asking them there name and if they want to come play with her. She'll try and grab their hand to lead them away with her. Just yesterday she met a little girl in the fabric store and was asking her name and rubbing the little girls belly.  You know kids don't hide there emotions and most kids just looked really overwhelmed and try to get their hand back. But a few week ago we were at the park (wow lots of park stories) and Marinn met a little girl that looked close to her age and they were playing together.  They seemed to be getting along great... I watched as they were hanging on some monkey bars facing each other and the little girl says, "hee hee hee you're funny!"  in the cutest little voice.  Well, it was time to leave and I told Marinn to say goodbye to her friend.  She was bummed we were leaving and went over to say goodbye.  She gave the girl a great big hug, then the little girl put both her hands gently on Marinn's face and said with such compassion and love, "I will miss you soooo much." Marinn put her hands on the girls face and said in the same honest voice, "I will miss you so much."  It was one of the sweetest things I had ever seen.  It was like Marinn had finally found someone like her... it looked like they had been friends for year.  A beautiful moment that I hope that I will not forget.

So... Have you hugged a stranger today?