Smile, Dammit!

Gratitude check:  that first glorious sip of coffee; sweet doggy knee kisses; time to fill with whatever I choose.

I am a small-town kinda gal.  

I thrive in an environment where faces and places are familiar.  

-Where I can give directions to a lost stranger without having to think.
-Where the place to "go for coffee" is common knowledge.
-Where if I blow a tire, and I'm sitting on the side of the road struggling with the rusted-on lug nuts, chances are someone will stop and offer me a hand.

Don't get me wrong - small town life has its own hazards and pitfalls.

-Last night's hoopla is this morning's topic of conversation.
-Really impressive mountains can be made from relatively puny molehills.
-The old boy's/girl's club is alive and well - and chances are you aren't a member.

Nothing's perfect, right?  Still, that kind of place is where I feel "at home".

Guess what?  I live in the city.  Not the ACTUAL city, but a suburb with a measly SIXTY THOUSAND PEOPLE.  For almost two decades.  I am a fish out of water.

Blub-blub.

It took me a long, long time to settle into "city life".  Everyone is in a hurry to get somewhere, all the time.  Speed limits are a only a suggestion.  People "dress" to go to Costco......whew!  

The biggest adjustment for me, though, was that no one looked at each other.  There can be 100 people sharing the same narrow sidewalk and, unless you accidentally stab someone in the eye with your umbrella (!), chances are that you will not make eye contact with one person.

I don't profess to understand the reasons for this disconnectedness - there are more learned minds than mine who could likely explain the sociological reasons for this insulated way of life.  All I know is that it is the norm in my world.  And it feels really lonely to me.

I made a game-changing discovery when I began to intentionally look for things to be grateful for in my larger world.  I found I could change the status quo, more times than not. All it took was a smile.

Smile!

With eye contact, preferably.

Most people didn't even notice.  A few made a little extra personal space for me, because they assumed I was a looney-bird.  One or two, however, smiled back.  Looked me in the eye.

Instant connection.
Recognition.
Simple humanity.
Ahhhhhh.

It was fleeting, but it was POWERFUL. And consistent - every single time I made the effort to smile and look people in the eye, at least one person replied with a smile of their own.  A momentary gift - it felt like a long, cool drink of water at the end of a very dry spell.

Specially to a fish out of water.

Which got me thinking that, perhaps, there were more fishes than just me in this urban jungle.  Maybe MY smile helped them feel more in their element, too!

So now?  Now I smile.  At pretty much everyone I see.  It has become my way to greet the world, and for the world to greet me, too.  My way to make the world I live in a little friendlier.  It works for me.  

It makes me happy.  I hope it makes other people happy, too.
Isn't that the point?

So smile, dammit!  It costs nothing, but to the person you give it away to it just might mean everything.

Sandi