The Happy Letter D
by Daniel Errico
Illustrated by Michiko Cayce
The Happy Letter D always has a smile on his face. His friend, The Letter U, doesn't understand why, and sets out to make him frown. Soon The Letter U discovers that not all letters see things the same way. The Happy Letter D teaches appreciation and perspective.
The Letter D lived in the Land of Words.
He was always smiling and always happy.
The other letters didn’t understand it.
He smiled all day long, sometimes big and sometimes small.
Sometimes he laughed so hard that he got the hiccups.
He was always happy and always friendly.
One day his friend the Letter U asked him why he was always so happy.
“I’m happy because there are so many things to be happy about!” said the Letter D.
“I bet I can get him to stop smiling,” thought the Letter U.
Then he came up with a plan.
“Let’s go see a play,” said the Letter U.
“Sounds great!” said the Letter D.
The Letter U brought the Letter D to the saddest play he could think of.
“This will make him sad,” said the Letter U.
They both cried at the end, but the Letter D was still smiling afterwards.
“What should we do next?” he asked.
“Let’s get some ice cream,” said the Letter U.
He knew that when he ate ice cream too quickly, he always gave himself a headache.
They both scarfed down their ice cream, and the Letter D’s head started to hurt.
But he was still smiling after.
“Let’s play a game of woozoo ball,” said the Letter U.
He had never lost a game of woozoo ball, but he knew that losing usually makes everyone upset.
They played a great game, and in the end the Letter U won by 10 woozoos.
The Letter D was smiling.
“I don’t understand it,” said the Letter U, “Why are you still smiling after all this?”
The Letter D explained, “I got to see a play with my best friend. And then we ate ice cream. And if that wasn’t enough, I got to play a game with you. This was the best day ever!”
And that’s when the Letter U realized that he’d had a great day, too.
He got to see a play, eat ice cream, and also play a game that he actually won!
He started to smile himself.
From that day on the Letter U stopped worrying about why the Letter D was happy, because he was happy, too!
In the Land of Words, you don’t need a reason to smile.