This week, my 10-year-old granddaughter and I watched Wonder. She’d seen it before. I hadn’t.

Truth is, I’d been afraid to.

The main character, Auggie, is her age. His story — born with a craniofacial condition, enduring surgeries, facing a world that can’t look past appearances — felt too close to my own family’s story. I’d lived through the parent side: the shock on delivery day, the medical challenges, the fierce hope that the world would be kind, and the ache of knowing it might not be.

When Wonder came out, part of me wanted to watch it together as a family — to connect, to talk, to honor what we’d been through. But another part hesitated. For me. For my child. Maybe I wasn’t ready.

Then, while scrolling through movies to watch with my visiting granddaughter, she suggested Wonder, “It has some sad parts, but it’s really good.” I admitted I’d been afraid to watch it. She didn’t miss a beat: “I’ll watch it with you, Zizi.”

So we did.

My fear dissolved almost instantly. Auggie drew me in, not just because I understood his mother’s perspective, but because I got to see the world through his eyes — and through the eyes of his sister, friends, teachers, and even his bullies. It reinforced the reality that you can’t shield the people you love (or yourself) from the hurt of exclusion. What you can do is respect their journey, listen to their feelings, offer compassion, and share your own.

And sometimes, gentle humor helps too. (When a friend asked Auggie if he’d considered plastic surgery, he deadpanned: “Dude, this is after plastic surgery.”)

Here are three things I am taking away and carrying forward:

• Don’t be afraid of differences. The superficial fades. What remains is the truth of who we are — our ordinariness, our extraordinariness. As Auggie’s friend Jack says of his face, “You get used to it.” It becomes ordinary. Auggie’s strength, however, is extraordinary, as shown when his principal selects him for a school award and says (quoting Henry Beecher Stowe), “He is the greatest whose strength carries up the most hearts.”
• Lost friends may return. Friends may hurt us or even leave us, often from their own wounds. Sometimes they find their way back. If they do, open the door.
• Look deeply. In her high school play, Auggie’s sister Via, playing Emily in Our Town, delivers the plea: “Oh, Mama, just look at me one minute as though you really saw me.” We all want to be truly seen.

In the end, watching Wonder reminded me that love isn’t about wrapping our people in bubble wrap. It’s about standing beside them, seeing them fully, letting them see us — and trusting that in the mix of hurt, humor, and hope, we all find our way.

Here’s to meeting life’s stories — the ones that scare us, surprise us, and heal us — with open eyes and open hearts.