Our kids’ school hosts a day of service on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday every year for those who want to participate. The kids come up with the organizations they want to support and what projects will help them do that. They are age-appropriate activities like making bookmarks for donated books, gathering items for local food banks, etc. So, this morning I put my parent hat on and talked to the kids about what it means to help other people and how we can all do something small to make someone else have a better day. We talked about who Martin Luther King Jr. was and the legacy he left behind. They got the basics, although they were still perplexed that some people had to live on the street. (“Can’t they just go get warm inside?”)

After all that talk, no one wanted to go to the service day. Hell, it was freezing out and, to be honest, I didn’t want to go anywhere either. I decided that modeling was the best way to lay the groundwork, as much as I hoped one of them would yell “let’s go!” And I knew that I would have to push this train out of the station (and not while wearing pajamas), because this was something I thought we should do.

While I was getting lost in how we pass the lessons of empathy and volunteerism along to our kids, two things popped up that gave both them and me a lesson about how the little things really do make a difference. First, my in-laws called to let us know they would have to put their 16 year-old dog down. Anyone who has had to do this knows how heavy it is. Our kids were very sad and had a lot of questions, of course. But we turned our attention toward how my in-laws must be feeling. Our beloved family Labrador was almost a goner about 2 months ago, thanks to the ingestion of a wasps’ nest (long story).

So our kids understood the heaviness of what my in-laws must be feeling. The kids decided to draw pictures of my in-laws and the dog doing their favorite activities. Very sweet. Then we headed to the flower shop (the kids’ idea) and got the most amazing bouquet of flowers that would brighten even the coldest of winter days. It was a small gesture and didn’t go beyond our family, but it was real life and they knew they made difference in the lives of someone they loved.

The second event was an e-mail I got from a friend in DC about a former co-worker who is very sick. She set up a schedule online for all of us from our old company to deliver or send meals. The woman who is sick is one of the most inspiring women I have ever met and she wouldn’t hesitate to help any number of the thousands of lives I know she has touched over the course of hers. I was reminded of the goodness of people. What a tremendous gift my friend had given by rallying everyone to provide meals. Again, a small gesture, but one that would make a huge difference in the life of someone we love.

We shouldn’t need a reminder to be the people we know we should be to one another. But sometimes we do.