It's the Little Things. . .

This is a really amazing concept to me. . . it really made me stop and think: what are the things/people/places I take for granted everyday that I would ache without if they were gone?

Here we go:
*the way my mom giggles at the stupidest commercials. . . giggles until she's crying
*how Moses sits on his hind legs with his front paws up in the air asking me to dance
*the taste of Mt. Dew when it is fresh from the fridge, in a can
*the sound of a book page being turned when I've high-lighted and noted it into submission
*the smile I hear when my brother says my name
*my dad giving me shit for watching another chick flick (that he secretly enjoys. . .)
*my backyard after a fresh snow. . . all glitter-y and spectacular
*Braden's giggle
*Belle's eyes when she's excited
*my gran telling me she loves me
*my journals and all the secrets they hold tight
*the feeling of bass pounding through my veins
*reading something I've written aloud and just knowing I've given someone the goosebumps
*the smell of my favorite perfume
*the stained and worn color of my favorite Chuck Taylors
*the way warm, homemade chocolate chip cookies taste
*the feeling I get when someone calls me princess
*the way my upper lip smells and feels after I've kissed a boy
*the way my stomach feels when a car "stops like a roller coaster"
*the fact that I am still, at 24, the first person, in my home, to wake up on Christmas morning
*the way I feel when all of my family is together, and how no matter where we are, that's home
*the girlfriends I can go months without talking to, but when we get together, no time has really passed
*being understood for all my quirks and faults
*being free
. . .
I could really go on for eternity with this.

It was Andy Warhol who said, "Art is anything you can get away with." What's your art? My art is writing, loving, laughing, and living. I get away with writing this blog and being totally raw. . . and you still dig what I have to say. I get away with loving with wild abandon. . . sometimes it hurts, but the lessons I learn are always worth it. I get away with laughing like I smoke two packs a day and at unheard decibles. . . people stare, but they won't forget it, either. I get away with living freely, like a child, too seriously, and in a perpetual state of contradiction. . . but somehow I am surrounded by the best people in existence. Perhaps while I'm living freely I will remind myself to stop and collect memories of the "little" things that bring me joy, make me smile,  give me reason to get up everyday and breathe.

So beginning with now I will understand that the little things can't possibly be small if they mean this much to me, that I have an obligation to define, refine, and share my art in order for you to claim yours, and that everyday I wake up, I have at least one reason to let my smile change the world:  so that you don't let the world change your smile.

Be free, be good, be a "little thing" to someone. . . and rewrite their life. . . in a BIG way.

-Stephi D.