The man behind me in the checkout line greeted the cashier with the standard, “How are you?”
The cashier responded with a broad grin. “I’m good!” she said. “It doesn’t serve any purpose to be miserable, does it?”
My father had little patience for miserable. He used the word to describe people who were not simply unhappy, perhaps for good reason, but more to the point, those who were nasty, irritable and just plain unpleasant.
He saw their behavior as spoiled and self-centered, people unable to be grateful for the many blessings in life. His feelings stemmed from having lived through the depression, which forced him to financially support his mother when he should have been starting high school.
His father was murdered when my dad was only eight, his brothers had families of their own, leaving him as man of the house. Surely, he had reason to be miserable, but his life-long habit of whistling, even when life brought its challenges, revealed a man with a happy heart.
My father would have liked the cashier. He appreciated people who embraced life in spite of its difficulties, especially when they could smile. A smile is a contagious joy, he used to tell me, which is probably why he was drawn to my mom. Her smile was enchanting, and the simplest pleasure would light up her face.
One of my favorite memories of my mom was her unabashed delight in musicals. Every Tuesday, for a time, she used to take me to the Strand movie theater to see shows like Flower Drum Song, Carousel, Brigadoon, Kismet and South Pacific. Never did she miss an opportunity to watch the films on TV, and every production had her singing throughout the house. She even bought me all the piano scores so I could serenade her from our old upright.
Needless to say, the songs and lyrics from dozens of musicals have a special place in my heart. So it was not surprising when, during a recent conversation, someone said “you’ve got to have a dream,” I immediately recalled the music and lyrics from, “Happy Talk,” one of the songs in South Pacific: “Happy talk, keep talkin’ happy talk, Talk about things you’d like to do. You got to have a dream, If you don’t have a dream, How you gonna have a dream come true … If you don’t talk happy, and you never have a dream, how you gonna have a dream come true?”
I’ve always thought of the Gospel as happy talk, which is why, as a newspaper editor who routinely reviews photos for print, I am always surprised at the dearth of smiles among worshipers in photos of the celebration of Mass. I am more reminded of the words of St. Teresa of Avila, who asked God to deliver us from “sour-faced saints.”
I suspect it is more cultural than a real lack of joy. Our tradition as western Catholics is serious, respectful devotion. Besides, it seems strange to be sitting in a pew smiling for no apparent reason.
Still, I’ve decided to give it a try. Hopefully, it will be a reminder for me that our faith in Christ should permeate our very being with profound joy. At the very least, people will wonder what I’ve been up to.
Mary Clifford Morrell is the author of "Things My Father Taught Me About Love," and "Let Go and Live: Reclaiming your life by releasing your emotional clutter," both available as ebooks on Amazon.com.
