Gratitude Monday: "Jesus, take the wheel."

It is not exactly a stop-the-presses moment if I say that the innovators who brought us the ability to produce and share online selfie videos from our smart phones have a lot to answer for. Because there is way, way too much of that dreck on the Interwebs.

However, there is cream in this ocean of souring milk, and sometimes it does rise to the top. Two examples I particularly like:

Last week a Texas woman named Candace Payne made an impulse purchase and was so tickled by it that she shared her delight on Facebook before she could even leave the parking lot:

The woman practically single-handedly broke the Internet, with her video going so viral it left Zika in its dust.  

As you might imagine, Payne has been blitzed with all manner of offers to monetize the video; she may end up with her own talk show. But she told NPR’s Rachel Martin that people have also reached out to her to say that her video with her truly infectious joy lifted their spirits at a point when they didn’t think that was possible.

And that’s a tremendous gift.

My other example is from last July, when a Tennessee woman named Veronica-Pooh Nash Poleate was troubled by reports of people being killed by sharks off the North Carolina coast. The spirit moved her on her way to church to fire up her video and remind us that if we go into the shark’s house, we can expect to be eaten.

I happen to think that “Watch the ocean from a distance” is excellent advice. Especially during shark season. Or, in the Chesapeake Bay, during jellyfish season.

One major commonality of these two videos is that both women talk about and embody joy. “It’s the simple joys.” “Let us rejoice.” This is something that it’s very easy for us to lose here in the reality of the 21^st Century. Sometimes it’s particularly easy for us to lose as we wade through the massive universe of vicious, ignorant, manipulative and fatuous user-generated content that the Web has made possible. Especially during an election season.

So today I’m grateful for Payne and Poleate, and others like them, who pop up occasionally online and remind me to look for that joy, even in places where I don’t think it could possibly be found.