Her Name Means Wild

The other day I stopped by Honda dealership to have my car serviced. The man at the desk asked me if I speak Spanish; it’s usually the other way around in my experience where the patient’s family will ask ‘habla espanol?’. Obviously he took me for being ‘Hispanic’! No shock there. I politely responded, sí. Kind of a white lie with half truth because I wouldn’t be able to hold an intelligent conversation nor explain why I brought my Pilot to the dealer, but I could tell him my favorite color and what I do for a living.

After discussing the car he proceeded to make small talk, asking, “did you have to work today?” I just responded with a no. He stared at me for a moment and asked, “you look like an important person, what do you do?”

Important, me? No way! I have never considered myself important. I was always the girl that wanted to get lost in the crowd and avoid the spot light. I don’t like drawing attention to myself and being the center of attention. It was my natural instinct to laugh and questioned, how do important people look? In my head, important people wore suits, high heels, and had perfect hair. I didn’t look like a hot mess but I certainly didn’t look like that. Am I an important person? Am I significant? Do I matter? I’m just an ordinary person, doing ordinary things. I go to work, I clean, run errands, then repeat. I don’t know, how would you define important?

Honestly, how many of us have defined important on outward appearance? ME. Sadly, I defined myself as unimportant because I didn’t have a certain look. God chose David, a skinny mini farm boy to be the king of Israel. David used a cheap old sling shot to defeat an enemy that was probably triple his size.

My role in society may seem small and insignificant to me, but I am a nurse who works with compassion and integrity. A few weeks ago life has been all sorts of heart breaks, between work & life. The first week of September, I mowed half the front lawn and ran out of gas so I left it unfinished. After crazy shifts and switching back & forth between days/nights, my body aching and sore, my mind so fatigued, I find my neighbor mowed all the unfinished areas that week for me. Then 2 weeks later.. I came home from church, thinking about all the chores/errands I need to finish before I can squeeze in a nap before work, only to find my neighbor mowed my entire lawn. I have the best neighbor, and he mows in straights lines! Bill is just a simple quiet neighbor, jeans and t-shirt kind of guy. No one would say that he is changing the world he however changed my day, in fact he he changed my week. He was crucial to that moment in my life. Through his generosity, I was able to actually physically rest, I was able to have all the energy I needed to be a better nurse that night and a better coworker. And my attitude was reflected to those around me.

Every little thing matters. And in case no one told you today, you matter. Each person plays a vital role to my day, my character, my life. You matter to the people around you. We are all part of something much bigger. Our days may be mundane but every little thing we do will have an impact on those around us. I don’t look like an important person and maybe you are a regular joe, yet even in the smallest way God has created us for a purpose much bigger than we realize. This world is beautiful because you are in it.