Every day was the same as the last: wake up a minute before the alarm goes off, then the blasted alarm goes off before I can turn it off.

One protein bar for the road. Embrace traffic. Try not to flip off any people trying to move into new lanes with their blinkers off.

I enter the office just in time. Hank waves me over. “You know the drill.”

I nod drowsily. Everything is the same. The same phone calls, the same paperwork. The same bland voice of Mr. Johnson on the phone behind me. I yawn. It’s contagious, I was quick to discover when starting my job.

I don’t have time to rest my head. I get up, and slowly walk to the coffee maker. I brew it and in ten minutes, the mug is in my hand. What a waste of time. Not.

I carefully walk back to my desk and sit down. My hands are folded around the mug and I take a sip.

Hank checks on me later that day, and drops a huge bulk of papers onto my desk. It shakes the table and my now cold coffee that was resting close to the edge falls and breaks-shatters on the floor, along with many sheets of paper.

I don’t have time to me scared or embarrassed for I look down to see not a huge mess, but a beautiful surprise. I find myself grinning. The coffee marks on the papers and the shattered pieces of mug give me a new world to admire.

The world will never be perfect, sometimes, there will be no way to stop traffic. Sometimes, the world just has to keep spinning.

My grin confused Hank, who always meant business, but I didn’t care, for I picked up a stack of papers and threw them into the air. The people in the cubicals stared up at the papers. Some smilled with admiration, others laughed, and others rolled their eyes and continued to get back to work.

But I didn’t. I Kept staring down at the mess, and after being offered a broom and pan, I causally swept it up, but I didn’t care now.

I hummed during rush our. I smiled a smile I never knew possible. For I knew that the world was bland. I was once living in a world of black and white but now, everything became so clear to me. I was happy here. I had colored the gray pages of life.