A trait that can be both seen and lived

Sometimes you see nobility in the most surprising places.

And if nobility seems an odd word to use these days, let me explain that I've just returned from two days of plays in Cedar City, including Shakespeare's Julius Caesar and Dumas' adapted Three Musketeers, so nobility is on my mind. (Plays were great, by the way.)

What I mean by being noble is having class, or having dignity and class put together, or just generally acting better than the normal every day way people generally act.

It's doing something extraordinary in an ordinary situation. Or something surprising when surprising isn't necessarily called for.

You don't often see nobility at city council meetings.

City council meetings are where people go to complain about the snow plows coming too late or insist that the traffic on their street should be slower than it is or that the new development down the street would do irreparable damage to their schools and their roads and their peace of mind.

City council meetings are where people get mad if their taxes are going to be raised or their police station is going to be built too big or their new neighbors will drive in front of their houses instead of the people's houses two streets over.

Don't ask me how I know.

But because I am so intimately aware of what happens at city council meetings, I was so unexpectedly surprised when something out of the ordinary happened.

In his last meeting as a city employee, Vance Garfield stood at the mic (something he is normally loath to do), and said he had made a mistake and would make amends, when he very well could have defended his involvements or justified his decisions or passed the blame to anyone and everyone else, as had been happening throughout the rest of the meeting.

A bright spot that was so unexpected it brought a burst of applause.

You don't always see nobility at breakfast.

But this breakfast was to kickoff a major fundraising campaign for breast cancer research and support.

I had been introduced to several who had survived their battles with breast cancer and heard their stories. Then I sat at a table and introduced myself to two young women and their father.

They were there, they said, in memory of their mother and wife. She died just 18 months ago and they were supporting every fundraiser, volunteering for every event, purchasing every fundraising item, in her honor.

They didn't have to get up for a 7:30 a.m. breakfast. They didn't have to round up people and ask for donations. They didn't have to do a Saturday-morning walk or spend money in support of the cause.

They did it out of love. Even though it was too late to save their loved one, they wanted to help save others'. It was noble.

You see nobility quite often as a reporter.

The church group gathering supplies for refugees, the military wife waiting to introduce her new baby to a husband just getting back from a deployment, the teacher dedicating her ideas and energies to her young students despite the criticisms and changes in law and lack of respect she and others in her profession regularly receive.

Anybody can be noble. If not always, then maybe here or there.

It just takes admitting when something went wrong, standing up for what is right, thinking of others besides yourself.

It's impressive to see.

Watch for it.

Be it.