Small Moments

by Emma Yago-Initser

“My dad was the one who taught me how to drive. This led to a lot of funny moments in the car with him.”

I believe it's the small moments that make up a person's existence. It's every small experience that adds up to the bigger picture. It's not always easy to see that it's these small moments that are the ones that matter—it's a thing that's learned over time. My dad has been key in helping me learn this. He came to this country from Soviet Russia with nothing but his education, and he made a life for himself. He's told me many times about the hardships in Russia and how he was so happy to come here to America. Of course, that means he had to work extremely hard to get to where he is today and how hard he has to work now to support his family of eight. In fact, he's so busy working all the time, that often all I get with him are the small moments. But these small moments are the ones that have brought us closer.

One moment I remember in particular is kind of a silly one. My dad was the one who taught me how to drive. This led to a lot of funny moments in the car with him. Now, this isn't one of those horror stories—in fact, it's pretty much the opposite. We were driving around Palo Alto and I was getting ready for my driver's test which was coming up, and, I decided to act as if each drive was my test. This meant making full stops and driving under the speed limit at all times, and just generally being extra cautious.

Of course, I'm sure we do that every time we drive but I didn't tell my dad I was doing this, and as I stopped at the first stop sign, making a complete stop and waiting to make sure it was safe to continue, he turned to me and said, "It says stop, not park." Of course, on my actual test I made full and complete stops, and I still do, despite my dad's many disapproving grumbles.

These small moments have also shown me some of the ways I take after my dad. For example, we have the same stupid humor. We laugh at the same jokes and often at each other. You know those conversations that you can have with your eyes, the ones where you can just look over at someone and they completely get you and you completely get them? I've had a lot of these with my dad. Every once in a while we'll be sitting somewhere and both of us will hear something ridiculous or something that would make us laugh, so we look over at each other and exchange a few looks, have an entire conversation, and burst out laughing.

When it's all you get with a person, you have to appreciate them. Oftentimes, it's not the big life-changing moment, but the small ones that don't seem like they matter, that change our perspectives completely. My dad has taught me one of the most important life lessons I think I'll ever learn. And I think that's the best thing he could have passed down to me, and something that I think will be very instrumental in developing who I am as a person and who I become.

Of course, every day is special, but think about if every day is special, how special one hour is, or just one minute. Spend your minutes the way you want to live your life, not the way someone tells you to. Make your seconds count. They only happen once.