Let me set this up so it'll make a little more sense. I work at a food warehouse loading trucks of finished products to ship all across the country. On a normal day, I'll load between 7 and 10 trucks in an 8 hour day. Today started off with 5 trucks showing up at the same time before I had even taken my first break. Needless to say, today started off... less than desirable.
It's company policy for us to tell the drivers to disconnect the air line from the truck to the trailer's emergency brake so that I can lock it. Safety first people. So I was getting ready to load maybe the 4th truck at this point. I went outside to ask the driver to disconnect the air line (I'll usually have them do it so I can't screw it up) and the driver, who was an older lady, probably in her 60's, explained to me that she had multiple sclerosis and had a hard time walking. I offered to disconnect it for her so she didn't need to get out of her truck. As I'm disconnecting it, I hear her ask from the truck, "Can I look at your tattoos?" So I proceed to show her my arm of World War 2 planes and a tattoo dedicated to my grandfather who served in the war. She seemed very intrigued by them and at one point said "Oh I just love tattoos on a man!
After about 25 minutes, I'm finished loading the truck, so I go outside to hook the air line back up and let her pull forward and offer to close the doors for her so she again, wouldn't need to get out of the truck. I close the doors and walk to the cab to let her know she's ready to go. The first thing she says is "You know, I think you're a hell of a guy to honor your grandfather like that." I thanked her and responded with "I appreciate that. It's the least I could do. He was a 20 year old kid when he went to war. There's no way I could have done that when I was 20." We wished each other good days and whatnot, and she drove away and I went back inside to continue working.
Something as small as her asking to see my tattoos, and then the short conversation we had, totally relieved all the stress of the day prior to those few moments.
Small things like that make me happy.