Fulfillingness’ First Finale

This time I counted.  After years of wondering, I gathered empirical evidence.  I needed some friendlier integers than those received on Tuesday, and Bailey did not disappoint.  Here are the far happier numbers gathered on walks yesterday among the shoppers at Arlington’s Pentagon Row and the apartment dwellers, bar patrons and office workers around my neighborhood:

68 - the number of people we passed (72 was the actual number, but I excluded people we already knew to avoid any bias)

24 - the number of people who demonstrated some sign of joy upon seeing Bailey—a smile, a tilt of the head, an aww or an ooo.

35 - the percent of people to whom Bailey gave a moment of joy

What a remarkable thing—my Bailey gives little moments of joy, small splashes of color in otherwise grey days, to 35% of everyone who encounters her.  She accomplishes this feat in only the moment or two that she appears in the visual field of a passerby whom she has never known and will likely never come to know. And she does this freely, without expectation, without reservation, and without questioning the qualifications of the receiver.  She gives moments of joy.

This has been Bailey’s role in life as a Golden—to spread seeds of joy wherever she goes. I have witnessed her touch thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of people this way.  And each time I think, with great admiration, of how fulfilled my life would be if I could bring a moment of joy to even a few people each day. 

Well done, Bailey.  Well lived, Bailey.