The Little Things

Today my family came visit me to celebrate my birthday. As my grandparents and I awaited their arrival, my grandfather and I decided it was too pretty of a day to be sitting inside. We originally had planned to walk only a short distance to a nearby bridge around the back of the house where we used to play as kids. We'd throw bread to the fish and sink our toes into the sandy water. By a pine tree we passed, there is the place where my first pet cat is buried. I remember spending hours crying by it even months after he had died. Grandaddy and I continued to walk over the bridge and into another pasture as he told me story after story about his childhood. "Over there is where daddy used to keep our white horse..." he would say, "I was shootin' squirrels in that tree right there when the game warden came through a lookin' for me." His southern charm always makes me laugh. We walked probably a mile through people's yards, around ponds, jumped over streams, and I could really tell towards the end that grandaddy was tired. He would have never told me that though. He would have never wasted one second of that time with his granddaughter to focus on himself and complain. At almost 80 years old, he's just thankful to be walking, and yet he took the time to take me on a mile journey through his past-literally and figuratively. That meant the world to me.

My grandmother had been cooking our afternoon lunch while we were gone, loving her family through the gifts the Lord has given her. I'm pretty sure she had planned to make banana pudding-my all time favorite dessert-for lunch. I saw the bananas and pudding mix, as well as the vanilla wafers in the pantry. After telling her that I was trying to cut sugar completely out of my diet for personal reasons, I'm sure she felt a little let down-although she never showed it. She just kept quiet and finished the rest of the meal. Her small gesture was enough to make me cry.

My family is under-appreciated far too often. Today I feel humbled and grateful for the little realizations in life that bring me to tears of joy and gladness for absolutely no reason.