Taking out the trash was a mundane task for me, but as I walked past the persimmon tree, a choir of birds prompted me to look up. The bare branches of the persimmon tree with tiny leaf buds waiting to unfurl was covered with a crowd of tiny birds twittering and singing. Each bird sang a slightly different melody, but together they created a symphony of joy and gladness. The morning was no longer mundane and ordinary. I looked up at the gray sky above me. I viewed the fresh green world around me. The world always seems brighter after the rain—fresh and clean. I left my empty waste basket by my door and walked up the sidewalk—looking and listening. Two doves perched silently on the telephone wires above my head. Their body positions and closeness conveyed the impression that they were a mated pair. I smiled and silently paid tribute to their devotion.
As I entered my home after that short walk, I thought about the birds who were singing this morning and I remembered embroidering a cross-stitch sampler in my Church class when I was around ten years old.
Greet the day with a song.
Make others happy.
Serve gladly.
Each line was embroidered in a different color—red, yellow, blue. I found that sampler over fifty years later in a box of my childhood treasures. It had been kept but never framed. Although it had been tucked away in a box for all those years, I realized that its words had shaped my life. There is a specific group of songs that I sing in the morning as I complete tasks in the kitchen. I have found joy in serving others and in finding ways to bring happiness into their lives.
I framed my sampler, and it hangs on the wall. In my storytelling/office room. I enjoy seeing it there, but I need no visual reminder of the words I embroidered so long ago. Its words live on in my heart and my life.