For those that aren't too familiar with the story, Tarzan is a human orphan that Kala takes on as her own child. Kala is a Gorilla. So Tarzan grows up with a family of Gorillas, swinging from tree vines, walking on all fours and even using his feet for peeling bananas. Pretty talented honestly. There is a scene in the first part of the Disney movie where toddler Tarzan gets upset and smears his face with mud. He then looks in a lake at his concealed reflection. For the first time in his life, he looks like everyone else.......he looks like a Gorilla.
Kala, comes up and gently starts wiping his face off while Tarzan asks "Why am I so different?" It's such an amazingly tender moment when his mother puts out her hands for his. A pair of giant brown Gorilla hands and small soft toddler hands join together. One huge and one small. "Forget what you see. Now what do you feel?" Kala says. She puts his hand on her heart to feel it beating. Just like his own heart does.
I have to admit that the first time I saw this scene, I got teary eyed.
Now my toddler, who seems to be more in tune with her emotions then most adults I know, has consistently offered her hands to Dave and I for the last week. She comes up to us and says "Two hands Mom" or "Two hands Dad". And she holds it. It's almost a game to see who drops their hands first. Sometimes she giggles and sometimes she just stares.
Maybe she's just reenacting a random scene from her favorite movie. Or maybe she just thinks it's funny that Dave and I do whatever she tells us to! She does have a sence of humor. But I think, just maybe, it is something more. I think she must realize the significance of that moment when we see that we are all the same underneath. That we all have two hands, two eyes and a single heart. And that's exactly what I think of everytime she is kind enough to remind me.
