It’s the Little Things

This week I posted to my social media page and thanked people for sending good wishes on my birthday. This, in turn, sparked a whole new wave of good wishes– high school friends from whom I have not heard in years, friends present and those whom years and changing circumstance have distanced. I received phone calls and flowers and more. It was like being queen for a day!

It was not a particularly momentous birthday like a decade marker. I can still say I am in my early sixties. I guess that can be considered momentous. There is, however, more to it than that. Despite the creaky joints, gray hair and pounds that cluster around my waist as the years go on, a birthday matters. It is a reminder that I am growing older and that is a privilege denied to many. It is a reminder that I survived another year, and this year is a doozy of one to survive. It is a place holder in the journey of days, all of which combine to make a life. And as such, each passing year is to be celebrated.

I was also reminded that the day after my birthday was the fifth anniversary of the death of my mother following a courageous and lengthy battle with Multiple Sclerosis. I remember my sister having a heart to heart with my mother and telling her she could NOT die on my birthday. My mom managed to hang on until the next morning. Truth be told, I would have been fine with it. It speaks to me of some mysterious circle of life that would have changed me in a unique way, just as all birthdays do. In the way that grief goes, five years were just yesterday and at the same time, it has been forever. Grief has a strange sense of time. Again I remembered how many people came to pay their respects, sent flowers and cards. I was so grateful for those who cared for us in our sorrow and grief. I remember being pleasantly surprised by those I never imagined would come and disappointed by those I thought might show up and didn’t. Grief is like that too.

Mostly, this odd confluence of days reminds me that it is often the little things that bring the greatest comfort and joy. In these days of great challenge and utter weirdness, it is the little things that put the book mark in our days. A friend suggested it may be because people are spending more time at home now. Indeed, that may be part of it. When (and if) life gets back to normal, it’s a reminder of what we might hold on to, those little things that make such a difference in our life and the lives others. Getting back to normal often means being over committed, over busy and often times over-stressed. In the midst of such moments it is easy to think that our puny little gestures may not matter all that much.

News flash: they do matter.

They remind us that others matter to us and we matter to others, sometimes in ways we had never imagined or ways we have forgotten. The seemingly small gestures are gifts to the day and gifts to be treasured.

Being remembered on a birthday is simple enough but it means someone is thinking of us. In times of sorrow, receiving a card or a phone call is a reminder that we are held in the hearts of others when our own hearts are breaking.

Too often we wait to tell someone they matter and then time runs out. Too often our busyness eclipses the better angels of our nature that know that it’s the little things that really do matter. Maybe this is one lesson of the pandemic, albeit one that has come at a terrible cost. It’s the little things that matter.

Don’t wait to tell someone they matter. Don’t put off writing that note or card to let someone know you are thinking of them. Don’t neglect the opportunity to say thank you to an essential worker and tell them you appreciate them. As they no doubt get rations of garbage from far too many people, you can make someone’s day by just saying, “thank you.”

Don’t put off the little things that ultimately make up a life. They really are the big things.