September 1, 2023
Day 2,506
Most nights when I am washing dishes from dinner, I look out the window right above the sink and find a mother deer and her fawn eating pears in our yard. I watch as they nose the grass and nuzzle each other in between bites of pear. It seems like a pretty ordinary moment to occur in the daily life of a deer; go to the yard with all the pears and eat them. But I'm very glad that I get to witness the doe and her fawn night after night. It's comforting to see them doing deer things together in my yard.
About a month ago, I helped my parents move out of the house they had been living in for over twenty years. We had been packing and moving boxes for many hours when my mom and I came to two large baskets of socks and some other bits of odds and ends clothing. My immediate response to those two large baskets was: "Just throw it away." My mom did not want to just throw it away. She wanted to go through it, piece by piece, and find her favorite socks. Since these were not my two baskets of socks to do what I wanted with, I sat down on the floor and helped my mom sort all the socks. When we were about halfway through with what I thought to be a meaningless task, I found a wee little ivory and mint green baby sock. I held it up and asked if it was one of her favorite socks. We must have spent hours after that laughing over that little sock. The packing, moving, and cleaning that followed after we found the baby sock were filled with laughter, joy, and fun.
I wanted to say no to sorting the basket of socks. I think about what I would have lost out on if I had said no and refused to sort socks with my mom. Laughter. Memories. An ordinary moment spent on the floor of my brother's old bedroom.
I think about the doe and her fawn. What would the fawn miss out on if she didn't follow her mother to our yard night after night. Pears. Nuzzles. Many ordinary deer moments spent in the shade of our trees.
It's comforting to me to think that what I thought to be meaningless moments can become like the pears and the socks. Eating pears and sorting socks can be the big, meaningful moments. We just have to say yes to them.
