RedState92%
Feel-Good Friday: The Kids Are All Right, Showing Us What a Caring Community Looks Like 48%
By Jennifer Oliver O'Connell67%
7/17/2026, 9:00:00 PM
Topics: Human Interest
BS Summary: This article contains 31 faulty reasoning types, including Halo Effect, Appeal to Emotion, and Anecdotal, with Biased Writer Voice as the most egregious example at 23.6% saturation with 263 hits. Analysis detected 1,546 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,115 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 49.2% and a BS Rank of 48% (8,891 of 17,004 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 52.30% of the article peer group.
It's always a good week when more than a few Feel-Good stories come my way.
I am especially heartened when the stories highlight kind, compassionate, and quick-thinking actions of young people.
It was difficult to choose, but three in particular stand out as exceptional examples of young people who represent empathic awareness and benevolent action beyond their years.
Incredible kids who make incredible, life-saving connections, is the subject of this week's Feel-Good Friday.
Seventeen-year-old Johnson Thompson of Tuscumbia, Alabama, was having trouble sleeping on June 30 as he healed up from an accident where he flipped his mower.
So, he decided to go to work in his family's shop.
What appeared to be happenstance turned out to be divine timing.
Just before 5:00 AM, 76-year-old Fannie Garner pulled her car to the side of the road across the street from the Thompson's shop.
“She got out of her car, and she was stumbling around.
So, I went out to the end of our parking lot to check to see if she was OK,” Thompson said.
“That’s when she explained to me she had a terrible headache and was wanting to know where the nearest emergency room was.”
Thompson realized something was wrong, so he helped Garner to his family's shop, got her a chair, and called 911.
He waited with her until the ambulance arrived, and while he probably wondered if the woman was all right, Thompson went about his day, not realizing his quick thinking had helped save Garner's life.
When she arrived at the hospital, the doctors discovered she had an active brain bleed.
Garner was medivaced to Birmingham Hospital, where she received emergency treatment.
Garner lived in Cherokee, which is about 20 miles from Tuscumbia.
She says she doesn't remember anything except having a bad headache.
Garner says she’s lucky to be alive, saying she had an angel with her in the form of Thompson.
Her family tracked the 17-year-old down to thank him the next day.
“Angel.
Hero,” said Garner’s sister, Gwen Goodloe, and Garner’s daughter, Tobisha, respectively.
Goodloe explained she figured out where Garner was picked up and located the warehouse.
From there, she found someone who knew Thompson.
Both families are forever bonded, and it's a beautiful thing.
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On the other side of the country, 14-year-old Royal Cothrun of Gilbert, Arizona, was out riding his bike in 100-degree heat.
Ahh, the days of being a resilient youth!
As he tooled around a sparsely populated open area, he noticed an elderly woman wandering.
She appeared confused and distressed.
Cothrun could have shrugged his shoulders and rode off to his day's adventures.
Instead, he approached her to make sure she was okay, then helped her get to shelter.
A 14-year-old Gilbert boy is being recognized by the Gilbert Fire Department and the Air National Guard after he stopped to help an elderly woman with dementia who had wandered miles from home in extreme heat.
Royal Cothrun was riding his bike when he spotted the 75-year-old Theresa Morgan, who appeared confused and distressed.
He moved her into the shade, contacted her family, and stayed with her until paramedics arrived.
The woman had wandered miles from her home in roughly 103º heat.
Her son said he believes Royal's actions may have saved her life.
No kidding.
While not as old as Theresa Morgan, I am a senior citizen, and I recognize my diminishing ability to tolerate heat and my need to pay attention to hydration.
However, Ms.
Morgan has dementia, so her ability to recognize, regulate, and care for herself in such situations is severely compromised.
This is also Arizona, where the brutal temperatures can fell anyone, young or old.
The Arizona Department of Health Services says about 4,298 people visit Arizona emergency rooms each year because of heat-related illnesses, and more than 4,320 people died from exposure to excessive heat in the state from 2013 to 2024.
Arizona also ranks among the hottest places on earth from May through September, when dehydration, disorientation and heat exhaustion can quickly become medical emergencies.
So, young Cothrun did indeed save Ms.
Morgan's life.
Cothrun was also wearing a pair of Meta recording sunglasses, so he managed to capture a portion of his interaction with her and his efforts to help.
This last story is a two-tissue tear-jerker, for sure.
Four-year-old Roman Butzlaff suffered incredible loss when his parents divorced and his father moved to Florida.
Despite the loneliness he felt, this North Carolina boy didn't turn inward, but instead, reached outward.
Roman decided to go outside every morning, and wave at and greet every person who walked or drove by.
It started with Wade Fulgum, who lives across the street from Roman.
Fulgum went over to meet the boy who was always waving.
They started doing things together.
Eventually, other neighbors followed suit.
They would stop and chat or even take part in activities such as drag racing down the street.
Anna Butzlaff said it was initially a bit strange because she barely knew any of these people.
"I didn't really know how to take it," she said.
"I just saw that my son was happy."
Roman didn't stop there.
He invited his neighbors to be a part of his world, inviting them to his soccer, basketball, and baseball games, and his swimming lessons.
Some of the neighbors even came to his preschool open house.
What kid does this?
It doesn't matter.
These senior citizen neighbors showed up for him when they could.
In turn, these neighbors, who were former strangers who lived near each other, began to show up and get to know each other as well.
All thanks to Roman reaching outside himself to greet the world and the people he met every day.
The beauty part: Roman's birthday celebration was huge.
Anna Butzlaff knew the only people she needed to invite were his senior citizen neighbor friends.
"They've made such an impact on him," Anna Butzlaff said.
"They are really special people to him."
Good time to grab the Kleenex, if you haven't already.
Editor's Note: At RedState, it's not all about politics and policy.
We like to bring attention to what's good in the world, with columns like "Feel-Good Friday," "Start Your Weekend Right," and "Hoge's Heroes."
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