Suspended Smiles

When I close my eyes and picture my dad, I see his twinkling eyes and his ever-present smile. And when I close my eyes and picture my dad, I see two other things, too ... I see a hat perched atop his silver hair and suspenders clipped on the waistband of his trousers. Daddy always wore a hat ... when he worked in his garden, he wore a ball cap; and whenever he left the house to go anywhere, he wore "dress" hats, a straw hat in the summer and a felt hat in the winter. For as hard as I try to picture Daddy with a belt on his pants, I can't ... I see black suspenders ... Daddy always wore suspenders rather than belts. I've got a file tucked away in my heart filled with questions I'd like to ask Mom and Dad when I get to heaven, and why Daddy wore suspenders is definitely one of them.

I mentioned in my post about attending my office holiday party a couple of weeks ago that I wore suspenders with my tuxedo pants ... black suspenders just like the ones Daddy used to wear. I'm not sure exactly what made me choose to wear them or why I became so fixated with them at the party (along with my black shiny shoes), but I made a point of showing them to all of my co-workers ... several times, actually, according to what I've been told. I didn't need the suspenders to hold my pants up, because my black tuxedo pants with the satiny stripe down the sides of the legs fit snugly enough that there was no risk of them sliding off. Though I'm not sure why I chose to wear them, I am sure of one thing ... my suspenders (or perhaps more accurately, my infatuation with them) made both me and my co-workers smile.

I've been sad for the last week or so ... too many rocks, I guess. I was really down yesterday, really, really down, and by the end of my workday, all I wanted to do was go home and go to bed. As I sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic, I couldn't help but think about a conversation I had earlier in the day with a co-worker ... a chat about the importance of recognizing when I need to change my attitude, a chat about how a small, seemingly insignificant action can bring about a huge adjustment in my outlook on life. So this morning as I stood peering into my closet trying to decide what to wear to work today, I made a decision that impacted my day in a way I couldn't have imagined ... I chose to wear suspenders. No, I didn't wear the tuxedo pants ... I wore black jeans with a blue shirt. The moment I clipped my black suspenders to the waist of my jeans, I started smiling. See here's the thing ... I can't wear suspenders and be sad ... it is simply impossible for me to be sad when I'm wearing suspenders. And here's the other thing ... everyone I saw at work today smiled when they saw how I was dressed. Come on ... how could you not smile when you see a gray-haired gal in suspenders? There's just something about suspenders, friends ... there's something about suspenders that makes people smile.

As I drove home tonight, I was struck by a thought ... my decision to wear suspenders today was bigger than me. Yep, they lifted my spirits and made me smile, but so much more important than my own smile were the smiles of my friends at work. Every single person who saw me today smiled and said something about my suspenders ... seeing me in those black suspenders made them smile, and seeing them smile made me smile in return. The truth is my smile has been suspended for a really, really long time ... but today ... today, I wore suspenders and I smiled.