You self-anointed a**hole,
Yes, I know that we have never met before. Yes, I know that seeing a genuine, happy smile in a sea of fake, overly-whitened ones must be a shock to your system. And yes, I know that you hurriedly took out your phone in an attempt to avoid awkward encounters in the long hallway that spans out in front of you. Why do you not smile at me? Why not take the .02 seconds out of your day to look up from your hand extension of an iPhone and say hi? Why can’t you wave and smile back?
“Why?” I ask, but in all honesty, I think I know the answer.
You don’t want to make new friends. You are intimidated at the thought of meeting a stranger. You would rather be in the virtual world than the living one. Your Snapchat story is so much more important than face-to-face contact.
This letter may seem overly aggressive, but coming from a girl who is good friends with her local Starbucks barista, her mailman and the curly-haired guy who does the Rollins landscaping, it isn’t. I have just always lived with the mentality that you can learn something from everyone—that the homeless guy on the corner can teach you just as much as a professor can, that a fortune cookie given to you by an old Asian man on Colonial Drive can teach you just as much as a text book. I am the type of person that subscribes to the idea that a smile can change your day, that a small moment can change your life, that one person can be your future. So, I smile, because that is how I am and that is how I will always be.
My question is: do you understand what you are doing to the overtly friendly people of this world? You have made us shy. For a while there, I stopped smiling and saying hi to people in the hallways because I knew, to the very depths of my soul, that it would not be reciprocated. I knew that each time a smile was gone unnoticed, a wave gone un-replied, that I would be utterly depressed.
Then, a few days ago, while reading a book for class, I stumbled upon a chapter called “Be Nice: The World is a Small Place.” I realized right then that my smiles and waves don’t have to be returned, that waving makes ME happy and makes ME have a better day. I am not smiling for you or for anyone else in this world. I am smiling because I enjoy smiling, I am waving because I enjoy being nice to people, I am saying “hi” because that is who I am.
So next time you see me in the hallway, feel free to continue burying your nose in your phone, feel free to glance at the upcoming palm tree like it is the most important thing you have seen in your entire life, and feel free to pass by me without saying a word. Or maybe, perhaps, you could be a decent human being and look up from your phone and say hi.
Sincerely,
The girl who always smiles
