Being Smiley

At church this past Sunday, I was far too occupied with addressing technical matters to get very much from the spiritual message of the day, but one thing did penetrate into my mind and linger. It was something about smiling at people, and thanking them for smiling at you if they do that. I think all this was supposed to be very good, but I'm not entirely sure about all of that. I was rather anxious at the time it was said.

Even so, smiles were on my mind recently. Like anyone (and perhaps even more than most), I find smiles difficult to fake or to create in response to nothing. I've been told lately that my face is not incredibly expressive. Even when I see a moment when I'd like to smile, I find myself struggling to come up with a convincing one. I feel like I contort my face in such a way that you'd think I didn't know what a smile was supposed to look like. At such moments, I feel like Nixon or Mitt Romney. Still, I try to do that, but I think I end up looking creepy.

Also happening recently was another incident with my least favorite librarian, and it made me like her a little bit better. I picked out some movies, grimaced when I saw that I had drawn her, and then had a very normal transaction with her. As she sent me off with some typically insincere-sounding pleasantries, she flashed a faint but real-looking smile at me, and I think the surprise that I felt resulted in an atypically-natural smile. I hope she felt encouraged to continue in that direction.

It takes some investment to draw smiles out of me, such moments as the above aside. Live comedy and conversations with friends achieve it best, and then it is like a torrent of smiles, laughs, giggle and all the other distinct expressions and noises that denote mirth. Ordinary encounters with people I don't know and banal conversations with friends don't really get me there. Still, I would like to smile more where I can manage it. People like that.