Recently my family, consisting of eight adults and two very young children took a trip to Costa Rica together. On the way to Costa Rica, we had a two-hour layover in Miami. Unfortunately, the first flight left New York over an hour late, leaving us very little time—less than 45 minutes-- to get our large party through the Miami airport to our second flight.

Before we landed in Miami, a flight attendant made an announcement. She requested that anyone who did not have layovers within the next hour please remain seated when we land and allow those people with short layovers to get off first. As a jaded traveler, I chuckled at her request not believing that people would wait for others to get off of the plane before they stood up.

As I stood up to leave the plane and begin the run to the next gate, I was shocked to see almost all of the plane’s passengers remain in their seats, including people in first class. Essentially, my family and only two others deplaned first so that we could get to our next flight in time.

As I looked at all the seated passengers, I could not help but be moved and thank them all for their kindness and courtesy.  As I write this story, I am still humbled at the small act of kindness of these people on that plane. Lately, we have been hearing a lot of stories about rude airline passengers but, on that day, I had a totally different experience.

Sometimes, it’s the small acts of kindness that mean the most.