Every Day Mantra

It's a beautiful day isn't it?

It was a solitary dog walk. Rain had refreshed the air. New spring leaves glittered with bobbing reflections of sunlight. “Hello, friends,” I nodded back at the bobbing heads of multi-colored tulips. Daffodils waved at me in the cool breeze.

The metronome sound of my footsteps matched the slow motion of my eyes taking in the world around me. “So peaceful for a world at war, a country divided, a life newly torn apart.” Six months gone since my wife, Diana, passed away, and our lives together only grew stronger in my heart. “Twenty years seem like a day, a day such as this, beautiful, renewed promise, new adventures to explore.”

“Pardon?”

She was a young and obviously frazzled mother tending to her tantruming child. Bowser leaned forward to lick the youngster’s face. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?” I chuckled at the joyous expression on the little one’s face as she hugged my dog and deposited a kiss on Bowser’s nose. “Pass it on,” I winked, knelt and traded a newly picked dandelion flower for the return of my dog from a hug that didn’t want to let go.

“Oh. Thank you. Yes.” The startled mom looked on as her daughter offered a smile and the dandelion weed turned gift up to her mother’s open hand. My chuckle echoed from her lips. She looked at the flower in her hand as the bus hissed to a stop and its door opened.

Mother and scooped up child climbed the bus steps. She waved back at me with the flower in her hand, smiled, and gave it to the driver. “Beautiful day isn’t it? Pass ite on.” She offered the dandelion to the driver.

“Your turn,” I nodded at his startled gaze.

Bowser sat and barked in agreement as the next passenger stepped inside, was gifted with the flower and “Beautiful day isn’t it? Pass it on,” erupted from the smile on the driver’s lips. It became a game. The bus shifted into gear. I waved as one seated rider after another received and returned the weed turned flower and the mantra from one to another.

“I remembered,” I spoke to the memory of my Diana. “How it made your day to bring a smile to a stranger’s face.”

This time of year there were countless dandelions being ignored by strangers ignoring each other. I tapped on the car window of a harried driver honking on his horn. “What?”

He was ready for combat, daring me to yell back at him. “Beautiful day isn’t it?” I sniffed the new dandelion in my hand and offered it to him. “Pass it on.” I suggested as his red light turned green. He turned down the blare of the morning news on his car radio.

Once again, it was like reality shifted behind the man’s eyes. “Oh. Sorry. My bad. Thanks for the reminder. Give the other fellow some slack.” He nodded, returning my smile and drove off with the flower drifting up to his nose.

I was out of flowers, me and Bowser heading back home. The sky had clouded up again. Rain started to fall. “I love the rain. Nice day isn’t it?”

An umbrella appeared out of nowhere as my eyes raised from the puddled ground. It settled over my head. The hand that held it hovering over us was that of an oldster like the hands that I possessed. “I’m Martha. I see you walking your dog each day about this time.”

She wore a droopy dandelion flower stuck in a buttonhole next to her chest. “What goes around comes around,” She winked. “You don’t remember me do you? I’m just another stranger in your eyes. It’s time we got acquainted, you and I.”

Diana hadn't wanted me to be alone. Here she was making sure that I wouldn't be. "Oh. Yes. Sorry. Thank you. I'm Bob." Bowser shook his wet fur as he settled between us. the sound of the pattering rain became matched with our footsteps.

No-one would think such a simple pleasure like sharing a comment and smile with those you might meet would be a spiritual uplift to one's day. I winked out a raindrop from one eye, replacing it with a newly felt grateful tear. I gazed up into the heavens and whispered a thank you to my Diana for this new gift she'd bestowed upon me this fine day.