The Little Things are the Big Things

This morning I noticed that our supply of toilet paper in the bathroom cupboard is dwindling. No matter. We keep a stash (though not a year’s supply) in our shed out back with other overflowed storage items. I made a mental note to remember to bring some in. A while later I went to the kitchen, and there was a huge package of 36 rolls that Bob had brought in before leaving for work long before the crack of dawn. I smiled. Bob always takes care of the Little Things. And the Big Things, too, but we all expect the Big Things to be taken care of. The Little Things are the frosting on the cake.

As an aside here, I have to mention that I had already been to the kitchen earlier in the morning and had not noticed the TP in plain sight and hard to miss because of its size. It wasn’t until I discovered a need that it “appeared”.

It was during one of our brief times apart when Bob was serving in the Army that it dawned on me that every car I drive has a bottomless well for windshield washer fluid. Maybe I was driving on a foggy day, or my windshield was dirty, but when I needed to wash my windshield, the solution appeared. I smiled and was grateful for all of the Little Things he always takes care of for me. Add to that car washes, oil changes, gasoline fill-ups and routine maintenance, and it becomes a really Big Thing. The short separations we had when he was in the Army provided the opportunity for me to remember all the often unseen little things he does for me.

Bob puts the toilet seat down. I hear jokes made about this all the time, but don’t think much about them. In 42 years of marriage, I’ve fallen in, in the dark of night, very few times. Not a Big Thing, but something I am grateful for.

He takes the garbage out regularly without being asked. Wednesday evenings, the night before trash day, he methodically goes through the entire house emptying waste baskets into a larger bag, changes cat litter, and peruses the fridge to see if leftovers are turning blue or old produce wilting and turning to mush. On the rare occasion I find the kitchen trash at the top of its container, usually because I have just finished some major cooking project at the sink, I just take it out. Asking him would be discounting all the good he does the hundreds of times between these occasional events.

Bob helps with laundry. I know that suggests that I must not do it in a timely fashion, but I can honestly say that even without his help, he would never have been without clean clothes to wear. He just likes doing the laundry. It’s a Big Thing, I know. In the early days of our marriage I didn’t always consider this a help. Many a treasured blouse was ruined, and he and I both wore pink underwear periodically in those years. And still do from time to time.

He does dishes. In all fairness, there’s no way this could be considered a Little Thing either. In the early days of our marriage, he felt the need to instruct me in the right way to do dishes. Mind you, my sister Kathie and I washed and dried the dishes by hand after dinner most evenings of our adolescent lives, and were well informed as to how to perform this task in a sanitary fashion. I’m not in the habit of leaving piles of dirty dishes for extended periods. A few hours, yes. A small number of them over night if we dirtied them in the evening and I was too tired to bother. But Bob quickly washes any dirty dish he finds in the sink. After he advised me early on that I didn’t know how to wash dishes correctly, I suggested that since he did, maybe he should wash them. We compromised. Sometimes I do the dishes, and sometimes he does, each using our own method without complaint from the other. Sometimes we do them together.

He changed diapers. His daughter’s, and all three of our grandchildren’s. He also gave baths. And played (and plays) for hours and hours down on the floor with blocks, Barbies, coloring or whatever with whoever needed (needs)a friend. Indeed, Grandpa is the playmate of choice. Ok, these aren’t Little Things either. They’re Big Things.

And I can’t even think of Bob without chuckling about his “Little Drives”. The ones that are sometimes 400 miles long. I can’t count the places I would never have been and the sights I would never have seen without his “little drives”. Because I’m not an adventurer and it would never occur to me to go some of the places he has taken me. Another Little Thing that really is a Big Thing.

Whether it be his bringing in TP from the cold dark shed, taking out the garbage, doing dishes or laundry, looking after and playing with his grandchildren or taking us on little drives, I am truly grateful for all the little things – that really are the big things – that Bob does for me and others daily without a thought. I hope to remember all these little things on my own, without a separation to remind me.