The Magic of Hello.

He was an old man.

He didn’t lean on a cane but still stood straight. His eyes were clear, and he was attentive. He stood in line with a dozen or so other people waiting to get popcorn at the theater.

Everyone else was pushing forward to make their order. If someone seemed to be taking too long, the dirty looks flew through the line like birds before a storm. It was a restless sea of people kept in check only by a thin shore of manners. They’d paid good money to see the movie and it was if they were afraid they’d miss something profound if they were delayed.

But not him. While everyone else was short with the clerk behind the counter, or impatient with the mere fact that they had to stand in line, he was a calm pool in that ocean of people.

I watched him, wondering about him. and then I saw what it was that drew me to him.

When it came his turn to make his order, he spoke to the cashier first as a person. “Hello. How are you today?”

The question seemed to catch the cashier by surprise, but for the first time since I’d started watching, I saw the cashier smile. It was a simple reaction. An acknowledgment that someone saw him.

“I’m fine, Sir. How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you.” And then he went into his order. He used old words that seem to have fallen from our vocabulary. Words like “Please” and “Thank you.” He smiled when he spoke. And it was as if he was tapping into some ancient, yet powerful magic because the effect on the people behind the counter was electric. Before my eyes, they changed, transformed in a way that was wonderful to see.

When he got his popcorn, the girl who was helping the cashier, unbidden, asked, “Sir, would you like butter?” Everyone else had yelled they wanted butter. She wanted in on the magic.

“Please.”

She put butter on his popcorn and handed it to him with a smile.

“Thank you,” he said with an appreciative smile.

As he turned to leave, the cashier called out, “Thank you, Sir. And Merry Christmas.”

“And to you two as well.”

And for at least a second or three, he brought peace to their tornado of demands and orders. And they’d smiled.

Then I realized what it was that I noticed. The man knew something no one else in the line knew and he showed it in his face and manner.

The world wasn’t about him.

It was about the people around him.

And he saw those people.