It was one of those Monday mornings where I literally rolled out of bed and walked to class in the clothing I had worn the night before. I dragged my feet along the sidewalk as my unzipped backpack weighed down every step I managed to take. I cleaned my thickly framed glasses with the end of my T-shirt — you know if I don’t have the time or energy to put my contacts in, it’s going to be a rough day.
I was walking through Arts Grounds, approaching the drama building for my first class, when I noticed an older man standing at a distance down the sidewalk. He faced the street, and he appeared to be waiting for someone to pick him up. While he anticipated his approaching ride, he wasn’t distracting himself with a cell phone to kill the time, but instead he looked tranquilly up at the sky and smiled at the swiftly shifting clouds. My morning crankiness left me hoping with every fiber of my being that this man wouldn’t turn around to address me.
The last thing I wanted that morning was to partake in any human interaction, no matter how trivial that interaction may be. As the distance between this man and me grew smaller and smaller, I could feel myself drawing into my own little world, and I was tempted to put on my headphones — a foolproof way of communicating my disinterest in sharing a common greeting with this stranger.
I wasn’t quick enough though. As I approached his area of the sidewalk, I could see the man turn his body slightly to face me, and I knew there was no way to get out of this. With an awkward and forced smile on my face, I lifted my head up to give the man a quick nod of acknowledgment, but I was immediately taken aback by the genuine and sincere expression in his eyes. He searched for real eye contact and held it for a moment with me, much to my dazed and tired surprise, and as he looked at me, smiled and said, “Hello ma’am, I hope you have a real nice day.” And as quickly as he gave me his attention, he turned back toward the road and quietly resumed his idle post.
I responded, “Uh, yes, and you too also should having a nice day.” It was a poorly constructed reply, and it sounded like something out of a John Mulaney comedy skit. However, as I quickly shuffled away to my class, I couldn’t stop thinking about how many times a day I actively try to avoid earnest and positive interactions with people I run into on Grounds. I tell myself it’s okay to have tunnel vision as I’m walking to class, that it’s acceptable to feel unsociable at times and that it’s natural to want to disconnect from the world occasionally.
Sure, all of these feelings are common, and while I’m positive I’ll still often feel the desire to shut everything out, am I really doing myself any favors by thinking I’m always justified in indulging in my crappy, disconnected moods? My entire day was brightened with the simple, but genuine, connection I shared with a complete stranger.
While it’s often easy to just keep my eyes to the ground as I amble my way to meetings and classes, it’s just as easy keep my head up and really see the people around me. That man probably doesn’t know how meaningful his words and smile were to me in that moment, or how often I’ve reminded myself how thankful I am to have had that interaction — but maybe he does know. Maybe he woke up that morning and decided he would deliberately choose to be kind and receptive with everyone he encountered that day, and maybe he knew something I didn’t that morning.
We’re all entitled to have bad days, to wake up on the wrong side of the bed and to feel discontent with our place in the world — but isn’t it so much braver and so much richer, to be gracious in spite of our sullen moods? Kindness costs nothing, and if we choose to spread it, it will fill us up when we feel we have none of it to give. It can be created out of thin air — maybe out of a genuine smile from a stranger.
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