The sign in the tailor's window

In a tailor's window on a side street in Ajman there is a handwritten sign, slightly crooked, that has said the same thing for as long as anyone on the street remembers: buttons sewn on free, while you wait. Nobody knows when he started. People still stop to read it.

It costs him almost nothing. Nobody asked for it. And it makes the whole street a little friendlier to walk down.

Most of us collect the opposite. We keep a running list of small irritations: the driver who will not let us merge, the delivery that says it is near and is not, the advertisement that follows us from page to page. We look after them, retell them, and carry them home. They do not improve the day. They make us sharper, and slightly worse company.

Quirks work the other way. The building guard who greets every child by a nickname he has invented for them. The shop that plays the same old song at the same hour every evening. The neighbour who waters the plants on the stairwell whether or not they are hers. They are small, a little odd, and free. They lighten the day for anyone who notices them.

And they are easy to find, once you start looking. They are not hard to keep either. A quirk asks for no upkeep. You simply notice it, enjoy it, and let it leave the door open for the next good thing.

An irritation has to be fed to stay alive. A quirk only has to be seen.