Altruism - A Failed Experiment in Gold Stars

Far too long ago I came up with the Great Idea of gold stars. It was the best thing I’d ever come up with. Better than dog-scootering through Wal-Mart, better than the day of silent sticky notes, better than the rainbow suspenders and bongos (which was not exactly a social experiment, but which did the trick.)

The idea was to get a bunch of gold star stickers. Hundreds. I would carry them in my pocket, and every time somebody did something awesome, I would stand up and walk over and stick a star on their shirt. How cool would that be? If you got the answer right in class and suddenly you get a STICKER STAR for it? I wouldn’t be able to contain myself. I would probably start crying.

So I bought 248 stars for three dollars, and I set off to live the dream. Only the plan never worked because I kept forgetting about the stars, and there are only so many times people do really awesome stuff. Of course, when they do, I am ready. Even so, at the end of every day I’d still come home with hundreds of gold stars, and they’d get mushed up in my pockets and stick together and fall apart and get lost in my pants.

I had not yet realized the purpose of the stars.

So I stuck the last wounded sheet of star stickers in my back pocket yesterday and set off to be rid of them. There were probably somewhere over 100 left, and at the beginning of my first class I decided that everyone has done something to deserve a star, and should all be rewarded.

I circled the room, clumsily delivering compliments and sticking tiny shiny stickers onto shirts and shoulders and collars and backpack straps.

“You get a gold star because you let me use your colored pencils once and dress nicely every day.”

“You get a gold star because you read philosophy books and write in cursive.”

“You get a gold star because you are my homedog.”

By the time class started, every single person in the room had a star. And all of them were shining.

It was wonderful. It was like we were a galaxy.

Throughout the day, I just walked everywhere giving everyone a star. Sometimes I would run out of people I knew well, and reasons for why they deserved a star.

“You get a gold star because your shirt has an owl on it.”

“You get a gold star because you woke up this morning and put on pants.”

“You get a gold star for fashion sense.”

“You get a gold star because in eighth grade I decided if I were a boy I would have a crush on you. Also because you are punk rock.”

We were standing in the arts hallway with some theater and choir kids, and one of them -- the marine biology girl from Economics -- asked me if I had gotten a star. Which, of course, I hadn’t. I hadn’t done anything.

She took a star and stuck it onto my shirt and said, “You get a gold star for being Shady.”

I frowned down at its luster, for a state of being is based entirely on a state of action, and what had I done to deserve to be Shady?

Martensen looked at my sheet of stars. It was only halfway full now. And, because Martensen understands things, he said, “I feel like - like something bad will happen when you give away all the stars. Like you’re trying to leave yourself behind and when the stars have been distributed, you will no longer exist.” Martensen has also been forgetting his medication, and slightly crashed a motorcycle a few days ago.

“Well,” I said, as if it were extremely important, “When you see you're running out of stars, you realize you would like to leave them behind in the best way possible while you have them. You know?”

There was this uh-oh oh-no moment shared when we suddenly realized we weren’t just being pretentious and metaphorical for the fun of it and there was actual truth spoken. It was very frightening, so we laughed loudly and painfully and went to class.

The true reason for passing out the stars was, I realized, to feel better. To make myself feel better by making others feel better. To give as much as possible in the time I have on earth. Because there are times when you have too many stars and feel that maybe if you gave them away you would feel less empty of them.

With each star distributed to each halfway-stranger, my lungs felt heavier. I had expected a lightness, but then found I couldn’t breathe right. The air was too dense and foggy and there was too much at stake.

The plan was failing badly.

Altruism is an extremely emptying feeling.

I was drowning in the spaces on the page where stars had once been and were no more.

So, I became desperate. In a weird, tired, depressed kind of way.

There was this kid eating a sandwich by himself and I just walked over wordlessly and stamped one to his shirt and walked off. Almost everyone I ran into had a star. They began to ask me for more.

One kid actually pulled out a dollar and volunteered to pay me for another. I gave him another and did not take his dollar because that’s not how altruism works. The empty feeling got heavier and heavier and kids kept coming, asking for them. Giving new reasons for why they deserved it. And I just kept sticking the stars on people.

There were only two stars left when I ran into Jay, a girl who sings and already had two stars. The first was for getting a solo in choir and the second was for “being suave.” With her walked Thomas, my science partner who plays cello and speaks softly and factually in a sarcastic display of bitter intelligence.

I was surprised to realize he had not yet gotten a star, of which he deserved very much so, for Thomas is my friend. I gave him his sticker gladly and felt like throwing up.

“There's only one left,” I said.

“Did you give Martensen one?” Jay squealed.

"Yeah."

“You should give him another one. Because he is a gorgeous human being.”

It is not normally insulting to call someone gorgeous.

I really, really felt like throwing up. Instead, I shut my eyes and actually quoted Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, each word like a small and distant explosion of pent-up insult and understanding:

“Sometimes the stars are only beautiful because of a flower you don’t see.”

She smiled thinly and I opened my eyes and had a small moment of panic before realizing she currently had no idea what I meant. I looked down at the single star resting on the paper in my palm and Thomas said,

“Or maybe the stars are just shiny?”

“But maybe they’re MORE THAN SHINY, Thomas! Maybe they’re more and maybe they’re less and--”

I hid my face in his backpack strap and did not say anything else.

“You should give Alli a gold star!” Jay said. She held a girl I did not recognize by the arm.

“I don’t know her,” I said.

“I don’t know her,” Alli said.

I looked at the girl. She was wearing a turtle pendant at the end of a necklace.

“I don’t know you,” I said. “But you’re wearing a turtle necklace..." There was very little left to be done. If losing stars hurt like this, the only cure would be to have nothing left to lose. "I have many turtles," I said. "My grandpa gave me them when I was little... I have many turtles.” There was nothing else to say. This was it. The last star.

When it was over, the sheet was empty and blank and brighter than I had imagined it would be. I threw it away and walked to math and there were no more stars.

Except, I thought, and looked at my shoulder, where the star on my shirt had remained unnoticed. The star for being Shady. The only star. Suddenly, every piece of joy and every sparkle born was contained in this single star. All 248 in one.

I had emptied myself of stars and still remained Shady.

I didn't even have to die. All I have to do now is exist.