James Snelling, of Richmond, Virginia is 72 years old. Every single morning, unless the weather is very bad, James stands at the corner of Maple Avenue and Bremo Road there in Richmond, and what he does is he simply waves to the passing motorists, waves ‘good morning' to them. He has become a kind of self-appointed ambassador of goodwill on that corner, and every day at 7:15 he's there and he stays until 9:00 A.M.

Because he's not as spry as he used to be, he has to often use his cane as he stands there. In an interview, James said that women are generally more generous in responding to his greeting than men are. One day he counted 180 women who waved back and only 75 men. A guy kind of thing, I guess.  James went on to say, "You know, I just do it for the fun of it, and what I have found is if you are nice to people, welcoming to people, they respond to that and they are nice in return."

Now that's such a simple kind of thing, isn't it, but how profound that is.  Hospitality is simply the ability to make another person feel welcome in a sincere kind of way. In a lonely world where people are rushing to one place or another, these busy motorists were made to feel welcome in the world by this man who stood there on the corner waving to them - someone who dared to break through that barrier of isolation and dared to offer a sign of hospitality.