Small Things that are Huge

atheist blog, atheist parent

There is love and nature and space and countries and the ocean and weather and our economy and shipping schedules and Hollywood awards shows and the Himalayas and the GNP and tidal times and who is abusing whom and which corporations are crooked and the crisis in the Middle East and death and life and the common core and the tax code and poor, hungry nations and national borders and drug cartels and global warming and cancer and floating islands of plastic in the ocean and eternity and ESPN and, like, whether you vax or not. Then there are the small things.

As a parent I am forever learning about my kids. Nearly every day reveals something to me that I had never considered before or that I had never paid attention to. You know, those moments that take your breath away, that feel exquisitely profound.

My daughter is an actress and she tells me that she can't even look at me when is on stage because my face is too...beamy. I know exactly what she means, but I can't help myself.

What are the moments from today you ask? Allow me to start last night. I took one of the kids to karaoke up in the city, a thing that he loves doing with friends. He barely mentions it all week, but come Saturday night he's in the car and driving away. Since his friends were busy or unavailable I was the next best. 

The little restaurant on some strip filled up with a large group of amazingly normal people. I watched as person after person filtered up to the stage with small scraps of paper, handing them off to the little Oriental fellow behind the console. Who knew that this little world existed?

I enjoyed a dozen people singing everything from Kenny Rogers to Salt and Pepa, voices from The Voice-worthy to, say, my voice. Suddenly I heard my son's name being called. He stood upright with deliberation and, before my very eyes, strode into the spotlight. As I sat on the edge of my seat with beaming eyes, the boy got a standing ovation for  his amazing rendition of a surprising Disney tune. Karaoke, a small thing.

Today, I beamed during the conversation with my other son, a conversation about Twitter. He and I have had about dozen conversations about the Twitter Feminism and how the vibe over there is so very anti-male. John's observation was that many of the memes weren't just pro-feminine, but also tremendously neg-masculine. It struck me; I hadn’t noticed the hostile undertones of this generation’s so-called feminism until he pointed it out to me.

More than the negative vibe, my son talked about how it affects him to be living during this generation of anti-male propaganda. My 14-year-old-son has often made comments about how much he values female things, because he considers all of those things to be human things. My favorite comment that he made about the subject recently is when he said I embrace my feminine side and all of my friends do too!

The small things. Moments of poignant strength, bravery, beauty, wisdom, love. Every single day I am reminded that raising these children to be unique individuals in this non-secular world is valuable beyond measure.