Just Say Hello

Like many days Tuesday dawned like any other day. However this was no ordinary Tuesday. This was Tuesday 16th July 2013 and this day was MOT day.  I'm sure like most people who drive, however confident you are about your car, the three letters which strike fear into the heart are M.O.T.

 Now fear not this post is not an hour long rant about the evils of the MOT system, however it needs to be mentioned to set the scene. I dutifully dropped the car into the garage with a smile and started back on my walk home. The walk itself normally wouldn't take more than maybe 5 -10 minutes, but due to my slightly increasing waistline I decided to take the slightly longer and scenic route.

 It was while walking, with the sun shining high in the sky, a slight breeze (thank you god) and feeling pretty happy about life in general that my mood naturally began to lift. So it was with a friendly smile on my face that I greeted the first person I saw. "Morning" i said with a happy tone and a pleasant smile. Silence was the reply as they passed by avoiding eye contact. Undeterred I continued on my walk, passing by a large lake, and stopping to enjoy the sight of a dragon fly gliding and diving over the water. A duck swam past and gave me a friendly quack, and generally bird song filled the air. I carried on, passing more people enjoying a morning walk. Again I stuck up a friendly "Morning" and again silence was the stern reply. I continued my attempts at conversation with anyone I saw on my walk, and of all the attempted "Morning" conversation starters the best I was able to achieve was a less than enthusiastic grunt from one passer by.

 While not disheartened by their less than friendly responses, it began to highlight to me the changing attitudes of people to others. We are living in a society so gripped with fear of other people and the unknown that we are pulling back into ourselves. I would like to say that it is more of a general problem and not one which appears to be affecting only the more urban area's of life, but I'm unable to. On a regular basis I walk in rural area's and canal paths. Time and again while on these walks I will encounter people either going about their day to day tasks or doing the same as me. A friendly "Morning" or "Hello" is responded to with a smile and a friendly reply.

 To many people life has just become to busy to spend time casually talking to strangers. If I'm walking in an urban area, I'm in a hurry, I'm busy on my phone texting or "talking" to someone, that I haven't the time to interact with mere passers by on the street. Anyway how do I know what they are like, I might say Hello and get stabbed just for looking at them wrong. While I accept and understand peoples reservations about speaking to a stranger for fear of what might happen, we also have to ask ourselves the question how many people are we passing by who might just need that simple "Hello" or "Morning" to actually be the only person they spoke to that day. Its a shocking thought to think that for some people, depending on the jobs they do, or the circumstances they live in, that simple greeting may be the only interaction with someone they have all day.

 I'm under no false illusions that this simple act will in some way change the world, but wouldn't it be nice to be the person on the receiving end of a friendly greeting. It doesn't even need to be a greeting, it can simply be a friendly smile, holding the door open for somebody. It can start in the smallest way and suddenly you find people smiling at you, greeting you, holding the door open for you, picking up an item you've dropped and passing it to you. Take a moment to think just how nice a place this world could be if we just took a few minutes each out of our hectic life to be friendly to someone else.

 So here is my challenge to everyone. It wont be easy and I'm the first to admit I'm having to make active choices to stay on this challenge myself. The next time you leave the house, whether going to work, the shops or anywhere. Take a few moments to smile at someone as you walk past (just a pleasant smile not a full blown grin) hold the door for someone, help someone who needs just a few seconds of your time. When your at work, again a simple smile, or a friendly morning. Hold the lift when someones running for it, it really doesn't matter how small or large the gesture is. If everyone does something small the impact felt could be massive. Hey you never know,that simple "Hi" could lead onto something massive for you in the future.

 I've started it already, and its true, not everyone is going to reply to you, or even smile back, but its over time that things can change. We lived in a society of community and friendship, is that really such a bad thing to strive to regain again, or are we happier to risk slipping further down into a world where communication has never been so easy or available  but where we lack the simple ability to greet another without being fearful!