If you should happen, by any unlikely chance, to know a man more blest in a laugh than Scrooge’s nephew, all I can say is, I should like to know him too. Introduce him to me, and I’ll cultivate his acquaintance.

It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humour.

~A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Have you ever heard a group of retired men in McDonald’s in the morning laughing together? The music of that sound makes me smile every time I hear it.

Yes, complaining and griping and negativity can also be contagious. When I am tempted to succumb to them, though, I remember these words of truth from Mr. Dickins and turn my ears and heart toward laughter. We needn’t ignore what is hard and ugly in life. Laughter, shared laughter especially, makes challenge bearable. It makes me stronger.