What I Didn't Know I Was Passing Down

I used to think "legacy" was a big word for other people. Politicians. Authors. Historical figures. Not a guy like me, who burns toast every third breakfast and tells the same joke twice in one evening. But the older I get, the more I notice that legacy isn’t what you leave behind when you die — it’s what you repeat without noticing when you’re alive.

My dad always whistled while he worked — fixing a bike, scrubbing a pan, or painting the fence. I never thought much of it as a kid. But now I catch myself doing the same thing, and what’s more, I see my daughter doing it too while drawing with her markers. I didn’t plan that. It just happened. These little echoes, passed from one person to the next, are sneaky. But they matter.

There’s a certain way I sit when I’m listening to someone — arms crossed, one foot tapping, eyes steady. I realized I picked it up from my grandfather, who used to sit just like that when he listened to my wild teenage rants. Now my son mirrors me. These aren’t lessons I taught with words — they’re habits I handed over with my presence.

And what about how we handle anger? Or kindness? I saw my father breathe through frustration instead of shouting — not always, but often enough for it to sink in. Now, when I pause instead of snapping, I know I’m not just managing myself — I’m planting something in the soil my kids are growing in. Something they might pass on to their kids too, someday.

We don’t get to choose everything we pass on. But we do get to notice it. And maybe that’s enough — to pay attention, to try a little harder to hand down something we won’t regret. I still mess up. I still say the wrong thing. But when I see my kids laughing like my brother used to, or telling corny jokes like I do, I think: this is it. This is the legacy. A string of small, human things. And it’s beautiful.