The other day, I was perusing the shelves of Best Buy with my family when I stumbled upon a binky. It was lying nipple-side up in the middle of an aisle. A few years ago I would’ve noticed it on the floor and continued my stroll through the store. At that moment, however, I began to wonder where the small owner may have been heading. Perhaps that binky was their favorite. Perhaps it was the most comforting or colorful of their stock. Or, more devastatingly, perhaps it was the last of their stock.
One of my daughters routinely ditches her lovey in favor of a pacifier to hold at night. She’ll have one in her mouth and another in a death grip as she sleeps soundly in her crib. This daughter is also notorious for catapulting things from the stroller when out and about. You’d think that a baby obsessed with pacifiers would do everything in her power to hold them near and dear. You’d be mistaken.
When I noticed the Best Buy binky, I was reminded of my daughter’s habitual displacement of hers. I conjured up a mental image of her comforting herself to sleep and suddenly had to ensure that this particular pacifier found its way home. I picked the binky up and walked to the nearest stroller-pushing couple to ask if it belonged to them. They shook their heads. I approached two other families who carried small children, but none of them took ownership of the lost item.
Unfortunately, I didn’t find the baby that the pacifier belonged to, but I did find myself in a small moment of tenderness. I wouldn’t have appreciated the value of such a tiny plastic specimen if I weren’t a mother myself. More importantly, I wouldn’t have empathized with the mother who may have had to replace yet another babyhood necessity.
In hindsight, that random moment and the realization that came with it may be laughable to some. To me, it is an insightful glance into how my thinking has changed. I’ve always prided myself on helping others, but my awareness of helpful actions has expanded since creating human life. I wouldn’t have considered the impact that something so presumably inconsequential might have on a mother and her child until now. Now I know that it’s the little things that can make or break a day in the life of a parent.
The cost of bottles, baby toys, and pacifiers can add up rather quickly, especially with multiples. I’ve had to reorder my fair share of the aforementioned necessities on numerous occasions. I’ve even been desperate enough to call my local Hobby Lobby to see if anyone had turned one of our sippy cups into the lost-and-found. You guessed it: my daughter had launched that thing from the stroller without a second thought. Laugh all you want! That sippy cup was the only one left in our collection at the time!
Saving another mother from having to worry about making additional purchases can save her money, time, and energy. It’s one less expenditure and one less thing that she has to add to her exponentially growing list of to-buys and to-dos. It may even save her baby from an avoidable meltdown and we all know how humbling that experience can be.
Even more humbling is motherhood as a whole. It provides all of us with a vast array of opportunities for growth and personal insight. Some may be smaller than others, such as my encounter with the abandoned binky, but I’m grateful that I can find something as seemingly insignificant as a lost binky and discover with it just how much compassion I’ve gained.
