When I was about 13 or 14, my weekends had a sacred rhythm. Saturday afternoons began with my mother’s gentle nudge: “Chalo beta, get ready, it’s time.” Off we’d go, first to the local library run by a father-son duo, where the beautiful smell of old paper welcomed us. Then we’d tackle whatever needed fixing that week: the mixer grinder’s stubborn motor, new batteries for a dying watch, shoes with broken straps. Finally came my favourite part: long walks in the park nearby, followed by sugarcane juice that painted green moustaches on our faces as we giggled in the golden light. In that park, peacocks would strut between the trees, and I’d always return home clutching a perfect fallen feather – my weekly treasure, proof of magic found.These weren’t errands. They were love letters to the world.Now I stare at my phone, finger hovering over an app promising groceries in eight minutes, and something deep inside me breaks a little more.Last year, I visited my hometown and walked to the kirana store. Always the first to strike up a conversation, the store uncle had watched me and my brother grow from uniform-clad kids to chasing big-city dreams. Our small updates somehow became part of his daily rhythm.During my next visit, the shutters were down. “He passed away a few months ago,” my mother told me quietly. Next to it, the stationery shop where I bought fresh stationery every June, my annual ritual before school would start, had been replaced by a sleek café serving overpriced sandwiches to strangers scrolling through phones.Two generations of stories, gone. The keepers of our small histories, replaced by efficient transactions that know nothing of our names. What happens to a community when all its connection points vanish?My Dadi loved her market visits. That was where she took the world’s temperature. In those crowds at the vegetable market, she’d gather gossip and recipes alongside her daily sabzi. And oh, the small victories: getting that extra handful of mirchi thrown in for free. Back home, we’d sit together sorting dhaniya and kadi patta, her weathered fingers teaching mine to separate the tender from the tough, the fresh from the wilted. For her, these weren’t inefficiencies. They were the very substance of being human together.These days, after my morning run, there’s Rahman ji at his juice stand where morning sunlight cuts through the buildings. He spots me coming, still catching my breath, sweat on my forehead, and his hands are already reaching for the vegetables before I say a word. I love watching the quiet dance of his fingers as carrots, beetroot and cucumber disappear into the machine. “Dhaniya nahi,” he says with that knowing grin, remembering exactly how I like it. In a world obsessed with algorithms learning our preferences, here’s a man who simply pays attention. Working from home as a marketing consultant, spending most of my days in virtual meetings and email threads, these moments feel precious.I know there’s privilege in this longing. The working mother ordering medicines between meetings, the elderly uncle who can’t brave crowds. For them, digital convenience isn’t luxury but lifeline. But for those of us who have a choice, what are we choosing? And what are we losing without even knowing it?Sometimes I wonder what my 14-year-old self would make of me now. Would she recognise this hurried stranger who has forgotten how to find peacock feathers?The rhythm is still there, waiting. In the vegetable seller who takes time to choose the ripest tomatoes. In the elderly neighbour who stops to talk about the rains. In the simple act of touching what nourishes us. Perhaps running errands – slowly, deliberately, hearts open, isn’t wasted time. Maybe, it’s the very soil where life worth living grows.Today, I sit with my containers of sorted dhaniya and kadi patta spread before me. Each piece touched, examined, chosen. My hands smell of earth. In the kitchen, my filter coffee drips slowly – drop by precious drop, refusing to be hurried. In these simple acts of sorting what nourishes, brewing what comforts, I find what my Dadi knew: the sacred lives not in the rushing, but in the tending. Not in the efficiency, but in the care.The errands are calling us home.Kanchan Balani is a marketing consultant based in Delhi NCR, where she lives with her husband and two cats, who continue to offer their editorial opinions (usually involving treats). Through her Substack newsletter ‘Homebody Stories’, she explores life’s quiet moments and the universal threads that connect us all.We’ve grown up hearing that “it’s the small things” that matter. That’s true, of course, but it’s also not – there are Big Things that we know matter, and that we shouldn’t take our eyes, minds or hearts off of. As journalists, we spend most of our time looking at those Big Things, trying to understand them, break them down, and bring them to you.And now we’re looking to you to also think about the small things – the joy that comes from a strangers’ kindness, incidents that leave you feeling warm, an unexpected conversation that made you happy, finding spaces of solidarity. Write to us about your small things at thewiresmallthings@gmail.com in 800 words or less, and we will publish selected submissions. We look forward to reading about your experiences, because even small things can bring big joys.Read the series here.