Think of You

I can’t not think of you

when I see a sunrise

I can’t not think of you

when I see Phineas and Ferb

I can’t not think of you

when I hear a sneeze

I can’t not think of you

when I see a lamb

I can’t not think of you

when I hear “Let Her Go”

I can’t not think of you

when I see white with cream

I can’t not think of you

when I see an elephant

I can’t not think of you

when I see a card game

but isn’t that the way life is suppose to be?

Filled not only with things and experiences

but with people

to define those things and experiences.

And so I think of all the people

that fill and define my life

with a smile

because that is what each of you

make me think of

Wikimedia/Jessie Eastland

Memories’s Magic Act

When the world seems too much

When the weather in my mind is rainy

When that familiar ache in my heart whistles its melancholy tune

When I miss you

Then I will think of this moment

I will think of it briefly and sparingly

Just enough to see the sun and change the melody in my heart

Because the more I relive a moment

The less its potency

It fades until the smile it gives

Is only a marred reflection

Of smiles past

How sorrowful it is indeed

That our favorite memories

Disappear

But that just means that we have to make new ones

user:Unsplash

God Didn’t Have To

God didn’t have to create beauty

but He did

God didn’t have to create color

He could have made the world only in shades of orange

but He created too many colors for us to count

God didn’t have to create smiles

He could have dulled us to emotion

but He created that feeling you get inside

when you know you are loved and that you love

God didn’t have to create rhythm

He could have made sounds dissociated from each other

but He created melodies that resound in your head

and march with your heartbeat

God didn’t have to create memory

He could have unhooked us from time

and only exist in the present

so much heartache and regret would be wiped away

and with it would be childhood friends and the smell of fresh cut grass

but He created moments that last forever in hearts

God didn’t have to create communication

He could have made us live in our own secluded existence

and prevent fighting and harsh words

and prevent jokes and “I love you”

but He created over six thousand languages

and countless ways to say “happy”

God didn’t have to create anything

but He did

I think God is an optimist

and we should admire the extravagance of a sunset

and not the ending of a day

God created beauty because He wanted to

Niagara Falls on a recent vacation

 

How Are You?

How are you?

A simple question

And most of us answer with a simple answer

But our lives are so much more than

“Good”

“Fine”

“Great!”

“Okay”

It’s a question that everyone asks

but do not truly need the complete answer to

It’s a phrase

not a question

It’s a saying

not a wondering

It’s a custom

not a need

It’s a habit

And

What’s up

is no better

and simply saying ‘Hello’ will lead you back to the question again

So I want to instead ask

How is life

as a whole

with the joys

and troubles

and fears

and stress

and sunsets

and doubts

and smiles

Yes, this may take time

and bring unwanted problems

but sometimes

it’s worth it.

But what is hard

with this culture we have grown into

is that it is bad to not be OK

it is bad to struggle

it is bad to be vulnerable

So we say that we are well

and that we are not depressed

having marriage troubles

or stress at work

or in a broken family

or can’t pay the bills

or do not know what to do

or just want to give up

We say that we are well

and smile

Eccedentesiast – one who fakes a smile

I ask

How are you, truly?

Me,

personally,

right now,

this instant.

I am lovely.

And that is not faking.

Smile

Is a smile saying that you’re ready to face the world or that you’re ready to face the world with a smile?

A old man who has dementia. His face is like a waterfall of wrinkles. He has no teeth and there is a gaping hole leading to his mouth. He can’t even remember his doting wife’s name. But he smiles. The wrinkles now become warm, comforting, and welcoming.

The little girl in Mali with her adult teeth first starting to poke through. Her life dire with war going all around her. Her parents are dead. She had no idea what those just beginning adult teeth will have to endure, but she smiles.

Eccdentesiast – one who fakes a smile. We all fake smiles. When we say that we are happy to see someone when we are really not. When we are trying to get something. We smile at a child’s joke to make them feel better. We smile to say that everything is all right, when it isn’t.

What is the difference between a fake, pasted on smile and a real truly joyful one? Is it the eyes? Their crinkle in the nose? The upturn of mouth a little more?  How do you make pure joy appear on one’s face?

The interesting thing about memories is that you don’t remember the actually memory, but the last time you recalled that memory. A study by Northwestern Medicine concluded the following, “This study shows how memories normally change over time, sometimes becoming distorted. When you think back to an event that happened to you long ago — say your first day at school — you actually may be recalling information you retrieved about that event at some later time, not the original event.” (More information at http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2012/09/your-memory-is-like-the-telephone-game.html)

Knowing this, doesn’t it make you almost not want to remember your favorite memory – in case you distort it?

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We can’t remember parts of our childhood, but it seems like we can through pictures. We look back through pictures and only remember what we saw in the picture not the experience. In the pictures everyone is smiling, but we don’t remember the event enough to tell if that was a fake or real smile. Everything begins to blur together because our distorted memory.

Look at a picture of someone you know well who is their only reason for smiling is for a camera. Is it their true smile? It almost looks like the smile they give you when they truly mean it, but it’s not. What’s missing?

Now think of their real smile.

But I couldn’t. The person I’m closest to, and I couldn’t remember her real smile. Is it because I can remember her so well crying with tears streaking and heaving breathes? I can remember her angry face. I can remember the absolute terror to overwhelming love. But I can’t picture one face of her’s that shows complete and utter happiness.

So that’s why I said ‘someone you know well’ because I can picture my friends and family with their truest and real smiles, but not the person I’m closest to. I think this is because we know them too well. You know their intricacies.

Does the fake picture smile and real smile start to blur together because you are remembering it too much? Does life do this to us also? Does life turn and flip and distort what is real and what isn’t? Does the fake petty life start to take over the real? Do you lose the twinkle in your eye?

Is it worst to be told that you never had a twinkle in your eye, or that you had a twinkle but lost it?

Have we never had the real life or have we lost it?

Fake verses Real.