A Not-So-Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Publication

It’s called COVID-19.

When the coronavirus announced its presence on the planet as we moved into a new decade, I was making plans to launch Smiling at Strangers in my hometown of Bellingham, Washington, in late spring, and use it to spark a local kindness movement fueled by fellow introverts. Normally, this is the time when Pacific Northwest residents come out of hibernation from the short days and wet gray of winter and begin hitting the streets, shops, and wooded trails, where encounters with strangers are common.

Instead, spring brought with it a global pandemic that restricted our presence in public settings except for purchasing food and other necessary supplies while masked and maintaining six feet of distance, marked with tape on store floors.

Suddenly, all of us—not just introverts—were dealing with a different kind of fear. Risking our psychological comfort by initiating connection with strangers pales in comparison with a primal fear for our health and even our lives. Ironically, the book’s target audience now includes us all, not just the shy introverts the book was written for.

So I put a hold on the publication date and book launch plans, assuming it wasn’t the time to release a book advocating face-to-face connection with strangers.

Then something happened . . .

As I made my forays into food stores to replenish supplies, I noticed that while some people seemed intent on getting in and out with as little interaction with others as possible, some were finding ways to connect and offer kindnesses to other shoppers. Like the man who noticed I’d left my cloth shopping bags in the bottom of my cart when the checker said they’d been instructed to pack all purchases in paper bags. Allowing kindness to overcome fear, the man followed me out to the parking lot and knocked on the window of my car, holding up the bags so I could lower the window enough to receive them.

While walking through the park that borders my apartment complex, I was surprised at the increase in vocal greetings I got from others as we passed one another (while wearing our masks and maintaining safe social distance). I soon learned that a “hi” or “good morning” and a raised hand communicated a shared acknowledgment of our connection.

Social creatures that we are, and kind at heart, many of us have found ourselves adapting and finding ways to “smile” at each other in creative and joyful ways. As I watched YouTube videos of Italians on their balconies singing together, I was reminded of the Dr. Seuss book How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The Grinch stole gifts from the children of Whoville in an attempt to stop Christmas, but the villagers instead stole and enlarged his small heart through the power of love and inclusion as they sang and feasted in celebration of the spirit of Christmas, even without material gifts.

Whether it’s singing from our balconies or porches together, organizing drive-by birthday celebrations, meeting neighbors who have been strangers for years as we’ve been busy engaging ourselves in the outside world, or having Zoom calls with distant friends and relatives, connection is happening.

Perhaps, I thought, this is the perfect time to remind people of what our hearts know. The perfect time to reinforce the message of our essential human need to acknowledge and connect with one another—strangers, friends, and family—through gestures of simple kindness like those my book suggests and illustrates. Although the world in which it was written isn’t the one into which it is being birthed, the call to join in creating a kinder and gentler world has never been more urgent.

Let’s do this together.