Everyday Grace

I was sitting on a soda-fountain stool shaped like a Coca-Cola bottle cap in an old ice cream parlor in Pittsburgh’s warehouse district when it came to me. I believe in everyday grace. This had something to do with the fact that a man I’m sure I looked at, but didn’t see, paid for my ice cream and that of my eight-year-old Big Brothers-Big Sisters little sister Samantha. He made sure he was gone before our bill came so that we couldn’t thank him.

I used think of the spiritual as the extraordinary, but I’ve come to understand that it’s just the opposite. There is enormous grace in the simple, common events of our days. The time we take for granted waiting for milestone moments.

My grandmother was a hard-working, first-generation American. A working mom before it was fashionable, she came of age during the Great Depression. She wanted to own her home outright and the fastest way to do so was to supplement my grandfather’s factory job income clerking in a drug store. She worked for security, but she saved for Lenox china and department-store clothes.

When she died 10 years ago, we found lace doilies and linen tablecloths, long fur-lined black leather Italian gloves, handkerchiefs and embroidered nightgowns and matching slippers. All like new, tucked away neatly. She was saving them for special occasions.

So many of us yearn for simplicity, but walk right past it like I walked past that man in the ice cream parlor. When I think about Samantha, I think about showing her things that are fun, educational, or vastly different from small-town life in a broken home and blended family barely getting by financially. Museums. Chinese food. Book stores. Office buildings. Subways. Jazz. Ballet. When I ask her if she wants to do whatever I’ve planned, she always replies, “I don’t care.” I used to take that personally until I realized it doesn’t matter. Her favorite moments are those I take for granted: setting the table for dinner, using a debit card at the gas station, ordering in a restaurant, buying an ice cream cone.

People praise me for spending time with her, “She’s lucky to have you. You’re broadening her horizons.” While that’s somewhat true, it’s she who’s broadening mine. She’s made me see the joy of trying all 31 flavors, ice skating around the Christmas tree downtown exactly 100 times, and wondering why the Easter Bunny left the price tags on her surprises.

The weddings, the birthdays and the graduations are special, but they aren’t the most important days. It’s those in between. Washing the dishes, reading a book, having a good laugh, planting a garden, playing catch, making a strong cup of tea. What happens in and around these moments is what we remember and should celebrate. A simple appreciation of extraordinary ordinary life. Now that’s worth saving.