What makes me smile?

There are so many kinds of smiles,
so I thought I would split some hairs . . .
after church one day
I asked my mother
why she smiled differently at the church people
than she did at home,
and she seemed to not know what I was talking about.
I was 9 or 10 at the time,
and never did get an answer,
but I thought about it a lot.
The smile she gave to the church people
was always a little nervous . . .
I figured that out later.
The smile at home was relaxed.

Kevin smiled at me just before he shot the gun at me.
The sales clerks in the shops and stores
sometimes don’t smile at all,
while the nurses and receptionists at the doctor’s office
usually offer a cool, professional smile.

There was a young girl
who lived next door when I lived at the old place
who always smiled at me
as if she had been waiting her whole life
for me to come along.
Her name was Claire.

Then there is my husband
who always smiles at me with twinkle in his eye.

Someone who smiles at me with genuine affection
always gets a smile back from me,
and sometimes I smile first . . .
I smile when something pleases me
or tickles my fancy.
I smile when I find a treasure in Nature,
like the time I found a seahorse on the beach in Alabama,
or was given the privilege
of turning on the lamp in a lighthouse on the coast of Maine.
I smile when I see a spider whose been soaked with a hose
pull his legs up
one by one
until he is as good as new,
and I smile at the people whose paths I cross in the course of a day,
always adding a twinkle.

It doesn’t take much
and it’s free. ♥