I know that sounds a bit ominous, but it is true. When we are out and about we are constantly on a stage for people to see and judge. This was apparent for me as a leader, an LDS Missionary, as a representative of BYU-Hawaii and in a career as a Foreign Service Officer and now as an employee for the LDS Church. It is nothing new to know that people watch how you react, how you carry yourself, how you treat others.
However, with all that practice of knowing people watch it was never more acute than yesterday when I realized how much my adult-like three year-old watches.
Utah has received a whole bunch of snow the last few days (it makes me wonder why we thought we wanted to live here haha) and as we are preparing for the new arrival into our family in a few days we have been going back and forth to the storage unit where all of our stuff is being kept. Apparently the storage unit management does not believe in snow plows because the last two times we went there is about a foot of snow between the storage unit buildings. We had made a "quick" trip to drop off some empty bins and as we were driving out I noticed an older man with his small blue car stuck in the snow.
So I got out into the ankle deep slush and mud sighing to myself that I was wearing my nice wingtip work shoes. As if that is all that mattered! I pushed and pulled and then borrowed a shovel to get the man out. The whole time frowning about the fact that I am wearing nice shoes that have NO traction and are surely going to be ruined. SO much for trying to help others...
It wasn't until later in the evening that I realized how much it impacted my three year old Lucky Dragon who must have been watching from the car. As he and I were shopping for groceries he told me, "Dust, when I get big and you and Mum get stuck I will push you out to safety." I was touched by that comment and could see that he was internalizing what had happened.
Then as we were saying prayers with him before he went to bed he was praying and after he had thanked Heavenly Father for all of the many things he was thankful for, Lady Hiva asked him if he wanted to bless anyone. He said yes, "I want to bless that old man in the blue car that was stuck." So he did. Hopefully that nameless old man felt loved somewhere by a genuine little angel.
As he crawled into bed he said to me, "Dust, I am so proud of you for helping that old man today."
Suddenly my ruined shoes did not matter so much. I was glad that instead of a bad example, at least this one time, my little guy saw me do something I may not have thought was a good idea and had done grudgingly a bit...but it made a difference to my Lucky Dragon that was watching. Made me want to be better person all
over again.
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