This Guy, Smiley?
"It is a wonderful experience," reminisces Thomas Merton in his spiritual memoir The Seven Storey Mountain, "to discover a new saint." Even more delightful, I consider as I come up for air, when that saint's name is Patrick.
The middle-aged male, or at least THIS middle-aged male is not noted for adding friends so readily and enthusiastically among the fellowship of the saints, which is how the Bible refers to the Church. THIS saint, Patrick, might have made himself a candidate for canonization by my decidedly egotistical standards just by reading what I wrote and offering feedback. See how benevolent I can be, I say with the President on The West Wing, when everybody does what I want? This saint, Patrick, grew in my good graces by what he wrote after commenting on this blog. His two words, "Keep smiling," were more impacting than a passel of mine.
If there is a personification of the Sesame Street game show host Guy Smiley, it has never been me. Photographers plead, quickly shifting their efforts to the unusually persistent blink above my grim expression. Generations of women in my life, in particular, have implored me to be more positive and to display that through my countenance. Somehow I counter, even if to myself, that the smarter a man is, the less ready will be his vapid grin. Somehow, in my persistent fugue, I can bypass the especially seasonally appropriate WISE men in Matthew 2:10 rejoicing with exceedingly great joy. Exception that proves the rule?
If the dour disposition, or at least the facial expression that suggested it, persisted, seriousness would be expected to settle in when I lost my job unexpectedly September 1. When I thought to manage a facial expression and life appraisal suitably sober for one unemployed, someone who had a right to expect gravity toward my responsibilities challenged me. "Aren't you always the one saying that God has a plan?" But when a new friend, a new saint in my circle, so to speak, sees a consistent smile and opens his mouth to say so, there is particular, almost proprietary power. He has only known me in this unsettled season, and yet he says I exude calm to chaos.
We hardly know the power of taking on new friends, even when our lives seem to be taking on water. We hardly know the power of speaking over the gales of our own turmoil to let someone else know the positives we see in him or her. Even our self-aware friend Thomas Merton with whose classic meditation we started this little missive benefited from a second, more objective, opinion. Still in Seven Storey Mountain, he was surprised when a Patrick in his life commented on his radiant expression. "It was not where I was going that made me happy, but where I was coming from. Yet this surprised me too, because I had not really paid any attention to the fact that I was happy—which indeed I was."
The middle-aged male, or at least THIS middle-aged male is not noted for adding friends so readily and enthusiastically among the fellowship of the saints, which is how the Bible refers to the Church. THIS saint, Patrick, might have made himself a candidate for canonization by my decidedly egotistical standards just by reading what I wrote and offering feedback. See how benevolent I can be, I say with the President on The West Wing, when everybody does what I want? This saint, Patrick, grew in my good graces by what he wrote after commenting on this blog. His two words, "Keep smiling," were more impacting than a passel of mine.
If there is a personification of the Sesame Street game show host Guy Smiley, it has never been me. Photographers plead, quickly shifting their efforts to the unusually persistent blink above my grim expression. Generations of women in my life, in particular, have implored me to be more positive and to display that through my countenance. Somehow I counter, even if to myself, that the smarter a man is, the less ready will be his vapid grin. Somehow, in my persistent fugue, I can bypass the especially seasonally appropriate WISE men in Matthew 2:10 rejoicing with exceedingly great joy. Exception that proves the rule?
If the dour disposition, or at least the facial expression that suggested it, persisted, seriousness would be expected to settle in when I lost my job unexpectedly September 1. When I thought to manage a facial expression and life appraisal suitably sober for one unemployed, someone who had a right to expect gravity toward my responsibilities challenged me. "Aren't you always the one saying that God has a plan?" But when a new friend, a new saint in my circle, so to speak, sees a consistent smile and opens his mouth to say so, there is particular, almost proprietary power. He has only known me in this unsettled season, and yet he says I exude calm to chaos.
We hardly know the power of taking on new friends, even when our lives seem to be taking on water. We hardly know the power of speaking over the gales of our own turmoil to let someone else know the positives we see in him or her. Even our self-aware friend Thomas Merton with whose classic meditation we started this little missive benefited from a second, more objective, opinion. Still in Seven Storey Mountain, he was surprised when a Patrick in his life commented on his radiant expression. "It was not where I was going that made me happy, but where I was coming from. Yet this surprised me too, because I had not really paid any attention to the fact that I was happy—which indeed I was."
For a moment, we can be the moon to another's sun, reminding of qualities so consistent they are first to be overlooked. Surely, we have as many reasons to have a positive word on our lips as there are holiday snowflakes. Surely, we can set aside our serious mien for a few seconds, as did the college student I once watched outside my office window who greeted a falling leaf with the playfulness of an outstretched tongue.
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