I had four hours to kill.
Friday afternoon in the Atlanta International Airport, I wandered among the multitude of travelers, trying to desperately get home while nonchalantly looking for a seat close to an electrical outlet. Realizing my quest for a sustainable power source was in vein, I decided that I would have to make due with the remaining few amps my phone and laptop possessed.
At hour three of my wait – now battery-less – I decided to people watch. Looking at the human smile is a good place to start. The smile, or lack of, speaks volumes. Here are the first few smiles I observed:
- The “I have a middle seat and the flight is full” smile
- The contempt smile
- The “I have no idea where I am” smile
- The “I just won the lottery” smile
- The “you have a bad attitude airline counter person and I’m going to pull you through a keyhole” smile
- The “I don’t know you, but you know me” smile
- The “naughty” smile – which I still can’t decide if it is a bad smile or a good smile.
Finally, as my flight was boarding, I did manage to catch a glimpse of the very rare and charming “heart-felt, welcoming-happiness” smile.
Here is a little trivia on the power of smiles…Smiling is instinctive and appears in infants almost from birth. The first smiles appear two to twelve hours after birth and seem void of content. Infants simply issue them, and they help parents bond. “I’ll never forget my daughter’s and my son’s first smile!”
Whatever their origin or motivation, smiles have a powerful and most often positive effect on us humans. Gosh, look what a smile does to new parents. Just think what a welcoming or happy smile can do for you!