Aside from youth pastor-y kinds of things, I’ve also been working as the nighttime janitor for the M-F daycare we have in our church building. As I’ve emptied trashcans, swept floors, vacuumed carpets and sanitized bathrooms I’ve been amazed at how randomly messy kids can be.
The bathrooms are usually the cleanest area in the whole building - while somehow, they manage to spill cupfulls of milk down the outside of the trash can liner. You’d think aim would be a skill carried across the board, but evidently it’s not.
Since the daycare runs until about 5.30, and I’m usually in the office until then - I don’t start cleaning until about 9 or so. This works out fine most of the time, but Wednesday night was an exception. Because of youth group and being hungry, I didn’t start until about 11 - which was just about the time I wanted to go to sleep.
For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to drink a 32oz energy drink to help me get through 3 hours of cleaning. It did, but it also got me through the rest of the night. And the next morning. Nothing like going to sleep at 5am.
Needless to say, I was pretty exhausted the next day (the rest of the day, rather). I got some stuff done, then decided to go to Costco to get my blood flowing and some stuff for the youth group. After procuring the desired saccharine-filled goods, I went to stand in line at the check out - which was roughly as long and as exciting as ‘Pathfinder’.
As I was standing there in line, trying not to fall asleep or throw up on the person in front of me, I looked up from my cell phone to see a group of 3-4 girls walking into the store. Noticing that they were particularly attractive, I did what most guys would do - quickly returned back to my cell phone.
After pretending to study some important document (i.e. Bejeweled), I looked back up to see if they had passed by yet. As fate would have it, I happened (I swear!) to look up directly into the eyes of (in my opinion) a very pretty member of the group. As soon as we made eye contact, she smiled at me.
Not one of those pity smiles I’m so used to getting - but a real, honest, maybe-she-thinks-i’m-cute smile. It was sweet.
In timeless Kierkegaardian form, I had to reflect on my reaction to receiving a smile from a pretty girl. Mere moments after she had left the area, I felt an surge of energy - no longer was I tired and weary. I didn’t even mind waiting in line. Very much.
So I think the lesson to be learned here is that female smiles are good and should be practiced with dedication to the well-being of young men everywhere.