Point For Joy

At a young age, Joy discovered that she had a miraculous power: she could make anyone happy just by pointing at them.

When her best friend was crying because of a low score on an exam, Joy pointed at her.

Joy explained to her friend that there were more exams to take, and extra credit assignments, too. There was ample time to study and get a good final grade, Joy said, and she was sure her friend was more than capable of it. The friend had soon stopped crying, and agreed that it wasn’t quite the end of the world she had envisaged.

Once at a coffee shop, Joy noticed that one of the baristas was sullen. The man was so unfocused that he got her order wrong, and when she brought it to his attention he sighed dejectedly and his shoulders slumped as if he bore a great weight. She pointed at him.

Joy told the barista that although she didn’t know what he was going through, she was confident that things would get better with time, no matter how bad they seemed at the moment. The sudden support caught him off-guard, and as he handed her the corrected order, he was smiling.

Over and over throughout the years, she helped friends and family, colleagues and strangers, brightening any room she walked into.

And when she was down, she would stand in front of the mirror and point at herself.

Joy would try thinking positive thoughts, like ‘I’ll get in shape someday’, ‘I’ll pay off my debts somehow’, or ‘I’ll meet and fall in love with someone again soon’. She would try, over and over.

Point, point, point.

But it wouldn’t work.

Joy discovered that she had the miraculous power to make anyone happy just by pointing at them. Anyone but herself.