In a world where there are so many ‘doing social media wrong’ — I had to share this story…

My girls and I watch Dancing With the Stars.

My daughters are all very musical and dance driven, so we watch, we critique and we get vested in our favorites.

Last week, my 7 year old was distraught over the news that one of her top picks Maria Menounos was suffering from fractures in her feet, along with her previously broken ribs…and STILL dancing!

So my girls and I talked about dreams, goals and perseverance and we also talked about using wisdom regarding your health. Then, we left it at that.

Maybe you can imagine my surprise…when at bedtime, my sweet daughter prayed for Maria. I was so touched that I tweeted her the next morning!

Now…here is where I expected it to stop. I mean, really – the woman is an entertainment reporter, a New York Times best-selling author (her book is excellent, by the way) and is devoting a chunk of her life to Dancing With The Stars…I did NOT expect her to be monitoring her tweet stream.

But she does.

Not only did she ‘retweet’ it to all of her followers, she responded.

At this point…I was shocked. Really. Call me jaded in social media – but I’m very used to the ‘type’ of folks that amass lots of numbers and then don’t attempt to engage. We’ve got divas, snobs and even those that are outsourcing their ‘social activity’ – and let me say that Maria is not any one of those things. I, of course, had to respond.

My daughter was squealing because she was ‘tweeted’ by a celeb!! So I thanked her! After all, Momma taught me to be gracious. (Maria might laud being Greek – but I am Southern through and through — we both have our strengths

At this point…I was thrilled. Maria had restored my faith in non-diva celebs…she had convinced all my girls that SHE was going to be the mirrored ball winner and our other previous top pick was now discarded along the wayside of Maria’s REAL-ness.

But what was interesting…is that it seemed MY family was not alone in being affected by this exchange. Maria was as well.

Maria kept thanking us and retweeting the prayer and note all over. Even @TeamMenounos got into the fun and started circulating this little random act of sweetness by my little girl.

And then…the icing on a fabulous cake…

This injured celeb, who was touched by my anonymous ‘could-be-anybody’ little girl praying for her, asked if she could send her a ‘Team Menough’ hoodie buddie. What she didn’t know is that my daughter is studying the performing arts, dancing, theatre, music and more. PLUS, it was her birthday!! She was OVER the moon.

Oh…and guess who she is cheering for, talking about and finding NO fault with? Yup. Maria!

I don’t share this story just to tell you about my little girl’s exciting week, but because I still firmly believe that social media can be a powerful way:

• to be heard (as in my daughter’s case)
• to render influence and genuine-ness (as in Maria’s case) and
• to show hundreds of thousands of others (as in all the watchers of DWTS) that Maria is real, she is listening and she still cares…even about the littlest fans.

She has my vote. And because you are reading this…whether you watch DWTS or not — I’m going to ask you to vote for Maria too! Vote for her dancing through pain, for her juggling all of her jobs, for her involvement with real people and for her caring about the prayers of a 7 year old fan…who can’t even vote without permission.

I’m not going to open comments up for this post – I’m going to ask, instead of a comment…that you go vote. Really…click on the image above or dial the phone. For Catie’s friend…Maria.