Our eyes met in the front row of a church balcony yesterday, with two empty seats between us. I noticed the toddler saw the bright lights on my Apple Watch, and I also saw that his dad, to his left, was wearing one too.
I was distracted by this little beauty, missing the message from below.
The cherub clutching his drippy cookie nub while wearing a tiny Carhartt jacket made us twins. He inched toward me as a single chocolate drool from his bottom lip hung in midair, held at bay for an impossibly long duration. Cool party trick, I thought. I watched it carefully because I guessed a chocolate glob might land on my sleeve at any moment, but honestly, I didn’t care much. There were more important matters at play here.
With his free hand, he reached out with a tentative “Is this okay?” glance as his tiny, messy fingers began furiously tapping on my watch face and turning the side button back and forth. I figured he was messing up my settings, but I didn’t care much.
His young, look-alike dad tried to intervene more than once, and I waved him off as if to say, Hey, no worries, you don’t know how much I need this right now. He offered his baby boy his own watch, even putting it on his wrist, but Sweet Pete didn’t take the bait.
Later in the day, as I was placing my watch on the charger, I noticed the face had an unusual, new texture: it was layered with crusty, blurry, hardened smudges. I had to scrub hard, and I felt a bit conflicted wiping it because I didn’t want to lose that little connection. In that precious interlude, Sweet Pete did mess with my settings. He took me to church. I received a message from above about the importance of taking time to cherish a simple moment. On my watch, I hope I left gentle fingerprints on him, too.