IT WAS convenient since the kinder playpen was also located in the same direction as the shopping mall’s restrooms. I waited outside it for a while as the rest of my family headed for the bathroom.
While I gently leaned against the glass partition, with a clear view of the inside of the huge toyland, I spied three children, about four years old, sitting side by side. And an obvious nanny or caretaker of the two was handing out snack packets to her wards.
The third child, clearly just beside them by circumstance, merely sat in stoic silence, while one of the two companions beside him appeared to animatedly insist that he get two (or more) packets than his pal.
As this went on, his companion, tired of his whining, without fanfare, suddenly handed his share to the silent (and surprised) bystander seated near him. Then, in one swift motion, he snatched an extra packet from the hands of their nanny. By then, a happy picture lay before me: all three children had a packet each!
I was clearly amused at witnessing what had just happened. While written on the face of the donor (not to mention Robin Hood/snatcher) was one of a satisfied gleam that hinted, “there, that settles it!” an opposite mask of dejection and contempt was firmly pasted on the other.
As for the third child, his face only wore wide-eyed surprise and ear-to-ear thankfulness.
The first thought that came to mind? Ah, children… they teach us more than we know. And sadly, our misreading and undervaluing of what we could learn in return because we only regard the moment as innocent. It prevents us from truly seeing whatever God-gene is implanted within each.
Then, a secondary impression of what I’d just seen, likewise played before me, as though a portend that mirrors what we all turn out to be, eventually. There will always be the givers, the just, as well as the receivers, then the selfish, the judgmental, and all of the rest that lie in between.
As I watched the emerging figures of my family from out the restroom doors, one final and lasting thought came, as I prepared to meet them.
Tight and capsulized in what I had just read in that scientific journal of all time, Facebook:
“I looked in your cup to see if you had enough; you looked in mine to check if I had more than you. We are not the same. Pay attention to what people measure.”
