Mr. Little Big Heart

photo by terence tan

This, my friend: is a picture of a 5 year old boy crying NOT out of protest but out of compassion.

My nephew Ethan (which some of you have met in my previous blogs) displayed his compassionate and honest sincere little heart today when he went to hospital to visit his mom (who by the way is in good shape - nothing major - so don't panic).

Neither Terence or I, have seen him cry all his 5 years of life. But today when it was time for him to leave the hospital, his face started to prune up - but he held it back...

All of a sudden, he reached out and patted his mom on the shoulder and encouraged her. A scene you usually see when your grandpa or grandma is trying to cheer you up when you had a rough day, after a decent hour of pap talk.

Then suddenly he looked at his mom and held her cheek and told her to take good care of herself and that she'd be ok in hospital.

I could hardly keep in the tears.... so embarrassing - but so touching.

You know, they say, One eye sees and the other feels right?!!!

Then, i guess, the little boy couldnt hold it in anymore and he started to cry but in a considerate fashion-quietly. But i was very very impressed that he wasn't crying because he had to go home, and be separated from mommy but he was crying because he was sad that she had to be left alone and left in a strange place where you are forced to wear green uniforms and have people come and stick things into you. You know when you are young, you hear horrid stories of how people go to the hospital to move on to a better place and its mainly for the old and dying. Go figure why he couldn't bare to leave her.

I doubt many of us would react that way when we were 5.

We only cry cause we can't buy a certain toy that we'd forget about after 5 minutes anyway (:

So innocent but yet so big and selfless was his little heart.

Three cheers for you Ethan.