some stories

inspired by lillian

story one My grandparents' house is filled with photographs of loved ones. There are both snapshots and formal portraits and I love to wander through the house, each floorboard creaking with love, looking at familiar faces and the faces of people that I've never met but feel like I have through the stories. I don't think I can adequately express how much my family means to me. They are my life, my everything. And I may only be sixteen years old, but I so look forward to the day that I start my own little family and pass on the stories as they were told to me.

story two This is the ugly sweater that grew on me. I saw it hanging on the rack and felt sorry for it and rescued it from a thrift shop for a dollar fifty. Instead of "thrifted" clothes, my mom and I decided to start calling them "rescued" clothes...because who else is going to take the clothes home and love them? (sometimes we're silly and sentimental like that)

story three As the summer drew to a close, I shared a little room in a house by the beach with my two older sisters for a week. The ceiling was sloped and the windows adorned with homemade red checkered curtains and I slept on a cot in the center of the room, with my sisters on either side of me. I walked to the beach barefoot on the little path, the dusty pebbles warm on the soles of my feet and my towel slung across my shoulder. If I try hard, I can still smell the clean fresh ocean air and taste the salt on my tongue. We ate nearly every meal outside, crammed around a too-small table, and while there may have been a shortage of space, there certainly wasn't a shortage of laughing and memory-making.

story four I thrive on simple dinners of soup and salad and bread eaten with friends around a cozy kitchen table. Community and the bonds that are made over meals is what life is truly about. It's funny how much of a difference some vegetables and chicken stock simmered on a stove and the company of good people make.

listen // watch // ponder