Smiles

Smiles make or break my day. You know those coke ads or other company ads where someone does something simple like smile and it incrementally gains momentum to make a big difference in someone's day? Well, that is how a simple smile in the morning from Amanda impacts my day.

Those days where I have to get up early and struggle through my day alone are so much tougher than those when I can wake up with Amanda and get just one smile out of her in the morning. When she smiles at me it lights up my heart and helps me know that she is doing well in the morning. Without her smile I spend the morning more worried about her, knowing that she is tired, stressed and overwhelmed with the tasks set before her. I can only hope that the smile I share back with her does the same thing for her as it does for me, uplifting me to face the day no matter what I might face. Sometimes it's even things about Amanda that are just silly that bring the smile to my face when she isn't around, but it reminds me of a happy time when I saw her smiling. For example I include the link to the Ozzy Osbourne song "Crazy Train" which for some reason reminds me of Amanda jamming it out in her little Corolla.



I'm not great at smiling. It seems to be something I inherited from my dad. It's not that we're not happy but just that smiling doesn't seem to be a necessary part of expressing how we're feeling. For example, I was terrible at smiling during half the photos of Amanda and I's weddings, and yet I was the happiest I have been in my entire life to be sharing that day and my life with my best friend. So my joy of marriage today is smiles and how effective Amanda is at lightening me up just by smiling at me in the morning or when I'm struggling through something.