Regarding the Importance of Everything

Everything matters.

Although, honestly, a lot of stuff just doesn't matter. But it might. You never know.

I'm not saying this to induce an anxiety attack as you try unsuccesfully to follow a pattern of logic which doesn't exist.

Life is just like that sometimes: it's full of contradictions. Things that don't matter in the small scheme of things are vitally important in the larger scheme. Or vice versa. Or versa vice. But now I'm just being silly.

On Saturday, I attended a baptism. A young girl was on the schedule to play a piano solo before the baptism. She made numerous mistakes and looked fairly embarrassed after she finished. I have no doubt that well-intentioned people would have told her, "Don't worry. It doesn't matter." That's true: the mistakes didn't matter.

But the song mattered, and the mistakes didn't harm the song at all. It was beautiful and it served its purpose. I was very touched by the simple song in a remarkable way and I wanted to tell the girl that the song mattered to me. I never got the chance.

That girl will never know that her willingness to take a chance in front of all those people mattered to me. There are a lot of people who will never know how much they have mattered to my life. Some of those people who have impacted my life are reading these words. You're probably thinking: it's not me. What did I do?

You smiled.
You laughed.
You inquired.
You stepped aside.
You stubbornly stood in my way.
You hugged.
You sang.
You danced.
You wrote.
You helped.
You listened.
You took the time.
You kept going.
You didn't give up on me, after I gave up on myself.
You remembered.
You complimented.
You were honest.
You weren't completely honest, when that was the right thing to do.
You held your tongue.
You told it like it is.
You warned.
You held back.
You were there.
You weren't in the way.
You cried with me.
You played along.
You reached out.
You helped me reach inward.
You were there.
You were there.
You were there.

If you think it didn't matter, think again. Everything matters. Or at least it might.