The Ferry God-Child

Laughter is the closest distance between two people. Victor Borge

I boarded the Washington State Ferry “Yakima” the other day, making my way home from Lopez Island – one of the San Juan Islands lying in Puget Sound. I had been on the island providing worship services for Grace Church and was now preparing for the forty minute cruise from the island to the terminal in Anacortes (where I’d left my truck).

I grabbed one of the seats located on the passenger deck. Although the boat has been in service quite a few years, it has been well-maintained. The seats are well-worn, but comfortable and clean. Unlike airline seats (which are about as spacious as the small end of a baseball bat), these seats can accommodate someone of significant girth (if needed).

I found a comfortable position in which to relax as the crew made preparations to get underway, and noted a toddler (probably about 15-18 months old) rumbling up the deck with one of those gaits that ranges somewhere between a walk and a trot to keep from falling. She had the biggest smile on her face as she trundled up the aisle toward the exit leading out to the forward observation deck. Her dad was in close pursuit, requiring only about a step or two to keep up with every dozen or so of hers.

She came screeching to a halt about four feet in front of me as if noticing for the first time she was in a public space and not alone. She looked up and noticed I was simultaneously looking at her and, seeing her wonderful smile, I couldn’t help but smile back like the silly doofus I can often be when I’m around kids. She saw me beaming and her whole body exploded into joy as she absorbed being the center of the universe (if only then and there for that precise moment), and then, filled once again with the life-force of the cosmos, she returned to her sallying forth.

Smiles are contagious, and laughter is purely magical. There is nothing more delightful to my ears than the sound of raucous laughing in a room. I will confess that I also interpret pun-induced groans as laughter in disguise. I don’t know why I like word-play, but I do. It is addictive, but as far as I know there is no Punsters Anonymous twelve-step group for people like me, so until I find or found one, the world will just have to deal with whatever PUNishment I inflict upon it. You have been warned!

I suppose the reason I enjoy smiles and laughter is not only for the energy humor gives me, but for the energy it can impart to those around us. That little girl on the ferry did nothing but smile, but I found it therapeutic. That’s important when the days are short on daylight and the weather is gray and nippy.

I don’t know why people tend to become so serious as we age. Maybe we don’t. Maybe it just looks and feels like we do. On that same ferry, I don’t remember seeing others smile as freely or as broadly as that little girl – except her dad. He stayed right with her as she circled the boat a half dozen times during the crossing. She was filled to the brim with boundless energy, and her father just stayed with her, opening doors as a proper valet should, and seeing to her every need (which was little more than the need to keep moving and smiling at everyone she met).

After about forty minutes, the MV “Yakima” slipped into port. Drivers and their passengers returned to their vehicles; we walk-ons stayed on the passenger deck to make our way back to land via the catwalks that switched back and forth from the upper level of the boat to the ground below.

Like the others, I grabbed my belongings and made my way into the darkness. A soft rain was falling as I trundled off to find my truck in one of the farther corners of the parking lot. I suppose the air was chilly, but I didn’t really notice as the smile of a young child continued to warm my soul and light my path.

I suppose that’s as it should be everywhere, and especially here in this, our valley.