The Small Joys of Life

     Growing up, my family had this de facto tradition in the early 2000s of watching NFL Primetime on Sunday Nights on ESPN. Hosted by Chris Berman and Tom Jackson, the show would provide highlights and analysis of the day's games. Each game would get a 2-3 minute highlight reel with the big plays and pivotal moments in the game. There was also some really awesome music that went with the highlights, but that's beside the point.

     If our lives were to be a "highlight reel," odds are that it would showcase the "big" or "pivotal" moments in our lives. These moments may include graduations, starting college, starting a job, making friends, vacations, getting married, children being born, and so on. Unfortunately though, Chris Berman and Tom Jackson aren't there to provide witty commentary and analysis and there's no sweet background music, either. But nonetheless, our "highlight reels" would be a snapshot of the best parts of our lives, the parts that we'll always remember. This can be especially true with social media's prominence today. If you're looking for a highlight reel of one's life, odds are you can just look at one's Facebook or Instagram accounts. However, for as awesome and wonderful as those highlights can be, those alone don't make up the majority of our lives. It is the "small" moments that account for most of our everyday lives, such as working, going grocery shopping, eating, etc. Basically, these moments comprise our everyday lives but wouldn't necessarily be classified as "highlights". Then again, people do post pictures of food on social media, but I digress.

     Although these "small" moments in life may not be highlight reel worthy, there still is a lot of joy and beauty in the small things in life. I took more pictures when I went to Idaho for 3 days than I ever have of walking to work for over a year, but I still do enjoy that walk to work, especially on nice day or in the rare instance there's snow on the ground. And just as The Office has shown (more on that later), joy can be found in the everyday work life. This can be found in the form of grabbing lunch around town with coworkers, getting free popcorn in the lobby on Thursday afternoon and free cookies on Friday afternoon, or playing pool with coworkers to close out the workweek. There's a beauty in the small things at home, whether that's eating Cheerios and sipping coffee before the workday starts up, playing Scrabble while listening to La La Land music in the evening, going for a walk in the park, or hanging out in coffee shops on Saturday mornings. 

     When I look back on my time at Baylor, I took the small moments in life for granted and only fully appreciate them now. I miss days of going to the dining hall alone but ending up having great conversation with friends I'd run into there, shooting hoops or playing volleyball with friends, joking about TJ Maxx, getting up early on Saturday mornings to go to Common Grounds right when it opened, or going for a walk around campus in the evening. Heck, I even miss just being the same spot I always had in the library (well, minus the studying/doing homework part). That is also why I enjoy the small moments in Houston a little bit more, whether that's going for a run with friends and getting tacos afterward, talking about "Bible minutia/trivia" with a friend while setting up class on Sunday mornings, or making an obscure reference to Fairly Oddparents and a friend picking up on it right away.

     There's beauty in the small moments in our lives. Those are what we remember. That is why I remember going to a Pizza Hut in a Target with my Dad when I was in Kindergarten. We'd get this Pizza Hut coupons at school, and my Dad would take me there after school for lunch when I'd get one (today's kids will never know the beauty of Kindergarten being a half-day!). When we can find beauty in the most trivial events and details, we can find beauty in just about anything. Our entire life won't be a highlight reel, but we can still enjoy those small, trivial moments. To close, I'll defer to the final line of The Office, said by Pam: "There's a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn't that kind of the point?"