A Few Rocks and a Few Words…

Picture this – you’re walking along in your day, somewhere, anywhere, and you look down to find a single, softly rounded stone that stands out from the rest. The rock has been painted and placed lovingly in your path with a message that seems to resonate with you in that exact moment in time, like someone who knew you and what you were going through put it there just for you.

As magical as that sounds, it has been the experience of many a wanderer since the start of an anonymously driven campaign that, rock by rock, has transformed into a global movement known as The Kindness Rocks Project, which has found its way to Rochester.

Started by a woman who lives in Cape Cod, Megan Murphy at first kept herself out of the picture by concealing her name, but as her website demonstrates, she eventually stood out like one of her rocks.

Murphy was always looking for ‘signs’ along her path. And one day she thought to herself, “Maybe I wasn’t the only one looking for such signs!”

That was when Murphy’s Kindness Rocks Project was born.

Concurring with Murphy that all things in life have meaning, I remember when I became an unsuspecting recipient of one such message that ‘vibed’ with me at that time in my voyage.

I was hiking across the Holyoke Range in Hampshire County alone two autumns ago, pondering my existence, where I was going, and what I wanted. I took a side path to my usual “pit stop” off the main trail and squatted down behind that big old rock I’d stopped at before and, breaking my concentration from the task at hand, I spotted a brightly-painted pink rock staring up at me.

“If your dreams don’t scare you, they’re not big enough.”

Uh, bingo!

Funny how these things happen in the strangest of unsuspecting moments.

That message had a lasting impact on me, and not only did it leave me with a warm memory of a moment in a place I love, hey – I even got a story out of it.

So, when I heard about the Kindness Rocks Project reaching Rochester, I grabbed my camera to seek them out and grabbed my cell phone to find out more about who was behind it.

This led me to the Church Wildlife Conservation Area off Marion Road in Rochester and to Library Assistant Lisa Fuller and her minions, the Junior Friends of the Plumb Library.

“I got the idea from a patron of mine who did a walk in Falmouth, I believe, and she brought one back to me and thought I would like it because I’m a crafty person like that,” said Fuller.

Fuller did some research that brought her to Murphy’s website.

“So we decided to do the project in Rochester,” said Fuller. “This is a great thing because kids can do it, so we made some with materials [the website] recommended.”

Over a few Junior Friends sessions, the kids created their meaningful masterpieces with heartfelt messages, words of wisdom, and simple cheery words such as “love,” “caring,” “be kind,” and “be bubbly.”

“It’s actually very relaxing and you get a little warm, fuzzy feeling when you’re making them,” said Fuller.

Fuller and the kids partnered with the Rochester Land Trust and headed out one day to find the perfect spots to hide their kindness rocks so just the right person would find them.

The Junior Friends also placed a few of them around the entrance to library to spread the inspiration to fellow patrons of the library.

“People have commented on them that it was a nice cheery way to enter the building,” Fuller said.

Are you feeling inspired yet? Visit www.kindnessrocksproject.org to find out more information on the history and future of the Kindness Rocks Project and maybe join the movement that is making tiny little changes in the world, painted word by painted word, one rock at a time.

By Jean Perry

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