Sound of Surviving Blog

“Lise, look at this! Lise, watch this!” Lisie, l-oookk!!” I hear my 3-year-old nephew calling, his tone growing impatient, as I finish looking up an appointment on my phone. “Sorry, bud, what do you need?” I reply.  “Look!” he says. As I watch him dance, or throw a ball, or hammer in a toy nail with a wooden hammer, I can’t help but smile. As I continue whatever it was, I was doing, I hear his innocent little voice call out my name again, and I put my things aside to go play Power Rangers with him in the next room. When it comes to my nephew, it’s like there’s a magnetic force field that draws me to be with him, and I drop whatever I’m doing.

A lot of times, in the past, depending on what that thing I was working on, it seemed important too, and I’d sigh, as I went to see what little sweet thing he wanted to show me. I have learned, of course, over the last few years, that spending time laughing, dancing, playing, and running around with this little boy is much more important than whatever my phone or computer are beckoning me to work on.

Once again, this little boy, a toddler, is teaching me yet another vital lesson. He is teaching me the joy that comes from diverting my eyes from my computer or phone screen for a little while, and that the laughter that comes from the memories I’m making with him, silly things he says, inside jokes that only an aunt and her nephew can understand, the feeling of warmth that hearing his little, excited voice say my name as he shows me something new he did, are all worth so much more than any job application, Instagram feed, email, or text message will ever be.

I always see my screen time every week come up and say, “You’ve spent however many hours on your phone per day.” What if we traded that time in for time spent with family or friends, laughing, and making memories? We only get so much time on this earth; do we really want to spend it staring at a missing out on all the magic happening around us?  In a world where everyone is constantly connected to a screen of some sort, it’s good to be reminded of what’s really important, of where our focus should be, even if that reminder comes from a toddler.