When I was just
starting out my interview idea, a friend from my university residence
came up to me and started to explain the story of her uncle, Jim
Moss, as a possible idea. I thought he sounded really cool, but in
all honesty, that whole conversation slipped my mind for a couple of
months. Then about a two weeks ago I decided to send him an email,
and we planned an interview. Jim Moss, and his wife Jennifer, are
probably the nicest couple in the world, and I wish I spoke to them
sooner. Needless to say, their story was still amazing, and my timing
in fact worked out funnier than anyone could of imagined. This story
(originally) is up Wednesday, July 3rd- also known as
“baby day”. Why? Because on Wednesday, July 3rd, Jim
and Jen Moss introduce Moss baby number three to the world, what will
be probably the happiest child in the world. Happiest, all beginning
from a rather scary moment in her (yup, a girl!) parents' lives,
starting in September 2009.
While I was starting
my first year of high school in Ingersoll, Jim was training in the
off months for his tenth season in the National Lacrosse League.
During the time when regular games weren't on, Jim worked at a store.
But it was the regular season that meant more. During the months of
December through April, he was known as “The Axe”, #55 on the
Colorado Mammoth. Named 2003 NLL Defensive Player of the Year, and
being named to the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame as a part of the
gold-winning Team Canada, “The Axe” was making his name known in
a second sport after leaving the London Knights (of the Ontario
Hockey League) as their captain in the 97-98 squad.
Getting to know Jim Moss
Photo by Victoria Alexander
Jim was married to a wife he loved (and still loves) dearly, had one
little child and another on the way. Then something unexpected
happened, an injury no one could have expected, not even doctors,
seemingly. Injuries were to be expected in his pro-sports career,
especially as a lacrosse player. Some of the things he was used to
included torn cartilage in both knees, separated and dislocated
shoulders, cracked neck and back vertebrae, a broken nose thirteen
times (well, fourteen if you include once by his son), but never
paralysis. One day Jim was watching television with his wife when he
collapsed, fully paralyzed. The doctors thought he contracted
something called Guillain-Barré
syndrome, a neuromuscular disease, but that was later ruled out.
After that, and still to this day, it's listed as an undefined
neuromuscular disease, permanently ending the professional sports
career of “The Axe”, Jim Moss.
Not
knowing the future, he decided he had to do something to keep some
positivity, for him, his wife, and child. He decided to keep a
gratitude journal in which he could record one little thing each day
that he was grateful for. Jim, to the suprise of many, made it out of
the hospital faster than would be imagined by anyone, in time for the
birth of this second child. While back home in Ontario, Jim was in a
hurry and scribbled a smiley face on a piece of paper, wrote what he
was grateful for at the time (the sound of his children giggling in
the bathtub) and posted it on Facebook. That was the start of what is
now internationally known as The
Smile Epidemic.
That
was all back in 2009, but five years later Jim and I both had
completely new stories. Leading us to meet last week on his back porch
and have some of the best iced tea I've ever had in my life. While at
his house, he was telling me how excited he was for the birth of his
new baby which would be a week away.. TODAY as of the day I'm posting
this interview. While looking at the Smile Epidemic app I saw a
photo, posted by a new account named “Baby Lyla”, with a smiley
face simply saying “I'm here!”. She's one of the cutest babies
I've ever seen, but her mom and dad have come a long way in a few
years, so I need to fill in the rest of the story, maybe Lyla can
read this on her tenth birthday (when I'm 28.. I'll be ancient).
When
I left off, Jim posted a photo to Facebook with a smiley face, and
now it's an app, website, blog, twitter account, and an international
movement in over 200 countries around the world. Now though, it's not
just Jim posting. The idea really took off, and the main idea is
really anybody can, and should, just post one thing you're happy or
grateful for that day, and post it online. You come to realize, after
a while it's easier and easier to find something you're grateful,
contrary to what you may think at first. After some others started to
post their own, Jim and Jen decided to make something out of it.
There were down to two name idea.. The
Smile Epidemic and
Smi-ral.
No
offense, but I think you picked the better name by far.
Jim and Jen Moss... one week until baby day!
Photo by Victoria Alexander
What
they really loved as it got going was that people all around the
world, no matter what country, were grateful for the same things. For
their pets, for their family, for the weather. Some though, stuck out
to the Moss couple, smiles they never thought they could help bring
back to people. They told me the story of a family of four, who had
just lost an aunt to cancer. They found out about the app, and the
whole family started doing this simply activity once a day, and they
told Jim how becuase of him, they're getting their smile back. Jim,
Jen, and myself couldn't believe how such a small idea can change so
many lives for the better.
The
couple reads the smiles every night, and now since the app is on
Blackberry, Apple and IOS software, more and more people are sending
them in. People have been grateful for “no more chemo”, and even
a little nine-year-old girl from Austrailia who wrote “having a
roof over my head and a bed to sleep in.” See? You start to see how
much you're grateful for. Some of the most insightful are the most
simple, like a girl they met at an orphanage last week who simply
said “waking up.”
I wanted to end with
that, where it is now. There are many goals now, such as bringing it
into the school and workplace, to create a more happier.. well,
world. One of the things Jen and Jim do with their children every
night now, around the dinner table, is ask them one thing that they
were grateful for that day, in the hopes when they're older they'll
continue. At this time, they still don't know what's wrong with Jim
Moss, and maybe they won't ever. He goes through periods were it'll
be anywhere from 3 to 21 days when he'll lose the ability to move his
legs, or experiences the same shakiness as one may who is diagnosed
with Parkinson's. When this happens, what Jim does is gets his
computer, and goes on The Smile Epidemic website.
He gets the chance to see all the things that he can be, and is,
grateful for. He told me that with out his illness, he never would of
been able to make any of this happen.
So
maybe, “The Axe” told me, just maybe.. if he has to be sick
everyday for the rest of his life to bring happiness to so many
people, it might just be worth it.
I'm dedicating this
story to the lovely baby Lyla Moss! Born on this sunny July 3rd,
2013. Her first ever Smile Epidemic smile was posted shortly after
she was born, and it reads “I'm here! 8lbs and 7 ounces, super
healthy and my Dad says I'm beautiful just like Momma. It's great to
be alive!”
Yes it is Lyla, yes it
is.
Me: "getting to interview.." Jim: "Me! The Smile CEO"
Jim Moss and I at the Moss home.
Photo by Victoria Alexander
Photo by Victoria Alexander
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