It’s a scary economic time, for sure.

But it is also a reassuring time.

Reading the front pages of America’s newspapers does little for your blood pressure. The power of greed seemingly knows no season.

On the other hand, neither does the power of humanity. For woven into the reports are expressions of gratitude and human decency.

It’s a time of contrasts.

Seemingly every day, we read about people who are exploiting the recession for their benefit.

In The Bulletin on Wednesday, there was a story about former executives of Countrywide Financial, who are now buying up, as The New York Times reported, “delinquent home mortgages that the government took over from failed banks, sometimes for pennies on the dollar. They get a piece of what they can collect.”

These executives, who certainly, as the Times reported, share some of the blame for the mess we are in, stand to make millions of dollars from the distress of other people.

Shame seems to be in short supply these days.

At the same time, The Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America, owner of Merrill Lynch, refuses to release to the attorney general of New York the names of 10 top executives.

It appears that this BofA subsidiary handed out $208 million in bonuses to these 10 wizards while their company sunk.

Doesn’t that give you a good and confident feeling about the wisdom of the billions of federal bailout dollars we taxpayers have handed these companies? Given what their fellow countrymen are going through, how do these people sleep at night?

Fortunately, there are other voices in the newspaper.

They are our neighbors and friends who write thank-you notes for publication in our “Person to Person” column in the Community Life section on some Sundays.

We have had a surge in the number of these letters recently.

No one can know for sure why, but I have an inkling that in times of stress, people have a heightened sense of gratitude for kind, thoughtful or charitable acts.

And the tone of the letters has changed. They are, simply said, more touching, more human and more personal.

Here is an example from Alice Fairchild, of Bend:

“In today’s world, it is sometimes VERY difficult to know if there are any honest people left in this world. The news, on a daily basis, says otherwise. Then something happens to reinforce the thought that, yes, there are some honest ones.

“On Jan. 30 , I was shopping at Wal-Mart in Bend. I sat on the bench at the exit of the store while my husband went through the checkout. When we left the store, I got up and left my purse on the bench. I didn’t notice it gone until we reached La Pine. I called the store right away, but no, no one had turned it in.

“The drive back to the store from La Pine was one of the longest I’ve ever taken, imagining what could happen to us if we didn’t get it back, if it was in the hands of some unscrupulous person.

“Some honest customer had found it and turned it in to a store employee who turned it in to lost and found. When we got back, I went to lost and found, they had it. What a relief! Everything was intact, as I had left it.

“We want to thank the honest person who turned it in. THANK YOU so much, from both my husband and me. Bless you.”

Here is another from DL and Wayne Bovi, of Bend:

“A heartfelt thank you to the delightful lady in the car ahead of us at the east Bend Starbucks who surprised my husband and me by paying for our coffees.

“It was a ‘Valentine’ that left smiles on our faces for the rest of the day. Please know that we will pass forward this act of kindness.”

Yes, it is a very difficult time.

But people can and do rise above it, and in their own words reaffirm the common goodness that links all of us.