Cultivating awe and wonder in everyday life

AMY HIRSHBERG LEDERMAN
Special to the AJP

She could do anything with her professional life that she wanted to do. Not many can boast of Sandy’s talents (and Sandy certainly would be the last to do so), but she is a highly educated, talented musician, a wonderful teacher and a dedicated mother and wife. So when she told me what she does in a typical work day, I sat back in wonder. 
Several days a week Sandy takes care of Ruth, an elderly and infirm woman to whom she is both caregiver and devoted companion. She does many of the things that a dutiful daughter would do — from driving her to doctors’ appointments and helping her shop, to writing holiday cards and paying bills. But she also does many things a daughter would find difficult, because they require a certain physical and emotional intimacy that does not come easily for everyone, especially grown children of aging parents.
On the days when she doesn’t work for Ruth, Sandy is a nanny for Jason and Becca, two adorable children under the age of four.  Her time with them is “delicious” and exhilarating, but it is also filled with the endless changing of dirty diapers, bandaging of scraped knees and preparing meals that often end up on the floor.  She loves them as a doting grandmother would — and tells me it feels as good as eating frozen yogurt. “All of the pleasure, none of the guilt,” she jokes and proudly displays the photos that she keeps in her wallet.
“Why do you do it,” I asked her one day, “when you could do so many other things that would be less taxing and more lucrative?”
“Because,” she answered thoughtfully, “I’m in awe.” Then Sandy proceeded to share two stories that have stayed with me ever since.
One morning when traffic was particularly bad, Sandy was about 10 minutes late getting to Ruth’s house. She knocked on the door and when no one answered, she called out Ruth’s name. Concerned, she knocked again and again — but still no answer. Just as she was about to call 911 on her cell phone, she heard someone cough. Slowly, the door opened. Ruth’s husband, Abe, stood breathless before her in his pajamas, while Big Band music drifted in from the kitchen. 
“Sorry, couldn’t get to the door,” Abe mumbled somewhat apologetically. “We had to finish our dance.”
At 9 a.m., when others might be complaining about their aches and pains, Ruth and Abe were cutting a rug!  Her cane was propped up against his walker, silent witnesses to a love affair that has lasted more than 60 years.   
Then, about a year ago, the phone woke Sandy in the middle of the night. Hoping it wasn’t one of her own kids, she was relieved to hear Jason’s mother on the other end.
“Can you come over, right away?” she pleaded. “I think I’m having the baby!”
Within minutes, Sandy raced out the door so that she could stay with Jason while his parents went to the hospital for the birth of his little sister, Becca. When Jason woke up, Sandy greeted him with a big smile and a bowl of Cheerios. They spent the morning together, making pictures and cards for the new baby. Jason was so excited he could barely sit still.
When Sandy brought Jason to the hospital, he became very quiet. They walked into the room, Sandy holding his chubby hand. Jason tiptoed over to his mom and climbed up on the bed. Before she could say anything, he leaned over and shyly kissed the sleeping infant in her arms. Then he cuddled up to her and said, “I love my family.”
These stories, and Sandy’s ability to experience the magical moments of everyday life, serve as great reminders of our continuing opportunity to experience wonder in our daily lives. We don’t need to travel to exotic lands or have mystical experiences on the top of a mountain. And while it is easy to become caught up in the nuisances of life, the details that can cloud our vision and preoccupy our thoughts, the wonder is there for the taking — if we are able to let it in.
Sandy’s stories remind me of the beautiful words of the great 20th-century Jewish mystic, philosopher and writer, Abraham Joshua Heschel:                      
“Awe is an intuition for the dignity of all things, a realization that things not only are what they are but also stand, however remotely, for something supreme. Awe is a sense of the transcendence, for the reference everywhere to mystery beyond all things.  It enables us to perceive  ... the divine — to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple; to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal.”
Amy Hirshberg Lederman is an author, Jewish educator, public speaker and attorney who lives in Tucson. Her columns in the AJP have won awards from the American Jewish Press Association, the Arizona Newspapers Association and the Arizona Press Club for excellence in commentary. Visit her website at amyhirshberglederman.com.