I was in the Atlanta airport on my way back from Cali, and our plane back to Richmond, Virginia, was delayed and we wouldn't be leaving the airport until after midnight. Our plane was originally scheduled to leave around 9:30 p.m..
There was a mother and her cranky, tired child. As cute as the little girl was, she was obviously driving her mother "insane" as the mother jokingly mentioned out loud. The mother did everything she could to make her little girl happy. Giving her cookies, cradling her so that she could rest and playing games on the tablet. What struck me next was that her mother began asking her about the Noah's Ark story. You could see the smile on the face of another woman like me listening to the little girl trying her best to remember the details of the story. The mom asked her daughter, "Do you remember how many days it rained for?" The little girl replied "50," and each time her mother said "no" and the little girl kept guessing. Her mom replied, "You're silly, it was 40 days." Finally getting closer to the end of telling the Noah story the little girl said, "I don't want to tell this story anymore." The mom said, "Why not?" and the little girl said, "It's too long."
As cute as this whole situation was, it was amazing to see and hear a mother sharing words form the Bible with her little girl. This is something that my mom did for me, and I can only pray that I will be able to share the stories that I learned with my future children. In that moment there was something so beautiful in a simple human interaction. In a world where there is a lot of bad things going on, there are still beautiful moments to witness no matter where we are.
As cliche as it sounds, every day may not be good, but there is something good in every day. It is my hope that today and every day you can be a witness to a simple human interaction that makes you realize that maybe waiting a couple extra hours for your flight isn't that torturous after all. Who knows, you might even be the one making the time better for others. For me, the mother doing her best to take care of her daughter and putting her daughter's needs before her own reminded me to be thankful for all the love that my parents have given me, sacrificing their own needs and wants so that I could have endless opportunities, but that is a whole different story itself.