The false smile....

Have you ever come across an American white lately? Look at them closely ..no I dont mean ogle!. They will definitely give you a ‘false’ smile. The other day while I was at the cafeteria; I asked one of my American (white) friends that why they felt the need to give a certain false smile. His reply was so muddle headed that I really thought I chose a wrong spokesperson for the white people. He said “We want to show people that we are not sad. We don’t have a sad side.” Even after our seemingly philosophical hash-session I wasn’t satisfied with his reply. Everytime I crossed a young lady or a man, I would get that ‘how are you’ followed by a false smile. Believe me that smile is so irritating.
The other day I was proctoring and came across a group of youngsters. Each of them would hand over to me their I-Ds and a false smile. This was getting too much for me. After some time my supervisor arrived, he seems rude and he is rude if you didn’t know him… that well. But somehow he was really sweet to me. One thing that struck me was that it was Christmas and he was still in Boston. I asked him why was he still in Boston. His reply blew me away. He said “Dude, my family is all fucked up.” and that was followed by a false smile. I was choked and didn’t know as to what expressions I should give. I suddenly got the reply to all my questions about ‘false’ smile. I looked into his eyes, for a second I thought his eyes were moist and the next moment – he smiled at me again and left. His pain seemed tangible therefore quite veritable.

It reminded me of Stephen Covey’s lines-‘When you know the root of trouble of an individual, you actually start to decipher his emotions.’ He narrates a touching incident in his life where he is traveling in a train and he comes across a man, who is traveling with his kids, in the same compartment. The kids are restless, bawling their lungs out and in the process, disturbing everyone in the compartment. This gentleman turns to the crowd and apologizes for his kids’ behavior and says “I am really sorry about their behavior; I really don’t how I should make them quiet. They just lost their mother to cancer. We are going to the hospital.” That sentence changed the attitude of Mr. Covey towards those children and the cacophony of mourning disturbed him no more.

I try to do my share of social service on the weekends. Two moons ago I came across this kid. He is always irate and defines the term rebellious in its most apt sense. But we, tutors, were really good to him. I thought…. being good was a norm in social service; but it was only after my colleague told me about this young man, I started to see him more compassionately. He had two gay fathers and he was an IVF (in vitro fertilization) kid. Sometimes when I think of these unfortunate kids; it raises my danders.They face this because of their irresponsible parents.They suffer and feel wretched all their life. Some absorb it and become reclusive and seem like a countenance of sorrow than anger but most rebel because when they look at kids around them they feel like they have been robbed off of the sweetest thing in life – parental affection. There are many in my university who experience this.

Probably the false smile is to hide this sadness…probably my friend was right…and he was the right spokesperson…We come from a culture where these cases are rare, by god’s grace. Thank goodness! And probably we must be a more judicious judge, more perspicacious in our thought and judgment, more tolerant to people around us (without losing our self respect of course!)…Probably we must talk less and listen more and probably one day we might get a true smile!