10 smile-worthy moments from this week and more

Need a mood boost? Here it is! [10 smile-worthy moments from this week to boost your mood]( Need a mood boost to help you sail through the weekend? Here are 10 moments that brought joy to our hearts and a smile to our faces this week. Enjoy! [Read the Story]( [Radio DJ rallies community to help a man he saw walking 6 hours a day to and from work]( Veteran Chicago radio personality "Ramblin' Ray" Stevens was driving in his car two weeks ago when he passed Braxton Mayes, 20, several times. "I was on my way home from work Friday and saw a young man walking down Kirk Road," Stevens later recalled. "I dropped my friend off at the studio I work out of and headed home. This young man was still walking. So I drove around the block and asked him if he needed a ride." "In our town, we help people out," Stevens said. After some hesitancy, the young man agreed. During the ride, Stevens learned that every day Mayes walks 12 miles between the west suburban towns of Montgomery and Batavia just to get to work. "It's just one of those things," Mayes told ABC 7. "You gotta do what you gotta do." [Read the Story]( [Olympian Allyson Felix announces $200,000 childcare grant for 10 athletes in collaboration with Athleta]( Allyson Felix is a six-time Olympic gold medalist and holds 11 world championship titles. But when the professional athlete gave birth to her daughter in 2018, her sponsor, Nike, decided to cut her pay by 70%. Even though pay cuts were a well-known practice, athletes who became mothers were scared to talk about it publicly. But as one of Nike’s most widely marketed athletes, Felix decided to use her voice to hold Nike accountable for what was clearly a discriminatory policy. In a tell-all op-ed for The New York Times, she revealed the regressive policy and after the hue and cry that followed, Nike changed its maternity policy. Felix, 35, is using her voice to help other women who chose to be both athletes and mothers. She has now announced that along with her sponsor, Gap’s Athleta, and Women’s Sports Foundation, a $200,000 grant is being given to professional athletes with the aim of covering childcare costs. [Read the Story]( [Want your mom to live longer? Study shows she will if you spend time with her.]( The study looked at 1600 participants with an average age of 71 and examined whether they were lonely or had healthy social lives. When the researchers performed a follow-up six years later, they found that 23% of lonely participants died within six years of the study, as opposed to only 14% of those who reported adequate companionship. "The need we've had our entire lives—people who know us, value us, who bring us joy—that never goes away," Barbara Moscowitz, senior geriatric social worker at Massachusetts General Hospital, explained to The New York Times. [Read the Story]( [2-year-old boy and 99-year-old neighbor strike up unlikely friendship amid pandemic and they're BFFs]( While the COVID-19 outbreak forced many to go months without meeting their best friends, it gave 2-year-old Benjamin Olson and 99-year-old Mary O'Neill the opportunity to forge an unlikely bond. After finding themselves pandemic prisoners for over a year, the next-door neighbors from Minnesota struck up a friendship over regular meet-ups by a fence that separates their homes. "For more than a year, he didn't see other kids. He didn't interact with anyone except our family and Mary," Benjamin’s mom, Sarah Olson, told TODAY. "They ended up forming an incredibly strong bond." [Read the Story]( Let's be social! [Facebook]( [Instagram]( [Website]( [Twitter]( [LinkedIn]( Copyright © 2021 GOOD | Upworthy, All rights reserved. 1370 N St Andrews Pl, Los Angeles, CA 90028 You can [update your preferences]( or [unsubscribe from this list](.