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- For love, and how it is the first thing to greet me anywhere I go.
- For my freedom
- For my family, and the ridiculously long group texts that keep us connected.
- For my every day people who are there through for the boring Thursday and the traumatic Mondays alike.
- For patrons of finance and spirit who never ever seem to believe that maybe I will fail and be useless to the world forever.
- For the world table and how we keep bringing new conversations to it, sharing our vocabulary and experiences, and using those stories to make this a better place for us all.
- For Dave
- For the blogosphere and the people who read and write it into existence everyday.
- For travel and how it becomes increasingly gentle with each new adventure.
- For my willingness and ability to learn.
- For those willing to take time to teach me.
- For food and how it spices my life.
- For my wrinkles and scars, my strawberry skin, my grey hair, and my rolls of chub. I am aging. Not everyone gets to.
- For books, always, and how I can access so many.
- For pictures and how they give me a way to speak when I don’t have any words.
- For therapy and medicine, and all the many forms they take.
- For my ability to walk forward without pain, both literally and metaphorically.
- For this space and the words it has encouraged.
- For GIFs
- For my name and the shapes it takes
- For tears, and how often they fall now that my heart is softened by life.
- For poetry that makes me think and feel
- For the United States Postal Service. *fist bump*
- For roses and foxes, and handsome princes who remind you what it is to tame and be tamed.
- For city sidewalks and how heels clap against them
- For gnome homes
- For California sunshine and how it somehow more “home” to me than the floor under my feet
- For museums and art pieces and the people who love them as much as I do
- For date nights, where I can talk about Dave and freedom and blogging without any discomfort
- For mythology and fairy tales and how they are stitched into my bones
- For foundation and makeup products made in my skin color
- For the continuing offshoots and sagas of Star Wars and Star Trek and XMen
- For emojis
- For the Braille Institute
- For potatoes, in all their magical manifestations
- For nail polish and sequins and and shiny jewelry
- For Little Footers and how they are already fixing this gorgeous world
- For the people who have been pushed down, but continue to stand up.
- For the people who are listening to the stories that are so very hard to tell.
- For my safety.
- For friends who are compassionate and honest at the same time
- For conversations that tangle and stretch and snap back at the oddest moments
- For this laptop, because it is my TARDIS.
- For Sharpies and post-it notes and journals and binders
- For tiny acts of kindness
- For the feeling of Knowing
- For code and how it lights up when I am talking to it.
- For bizarre, beautiful, and/or silly Instagram accounts
- For the Universe and her provisions
- For You, best Beloved reader
Visit the others who played along here: https://talesfromthemotherland.me/2018/01/02/50-happy-things-2017-bloggers-unite-to-flood-the-internet-with-gratitude/[P.S. Over at that link, Dawn still has the most original version of the “You are Loved” badge up on our site. 😍]
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♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥Ra Avis is the author of Sack Nasty: Prison Poetry and the girl behind the dinosaur at Rarasaur.com. She is a once-upon-a-time inmate, a reluctantly-optimistic widow, and an exponential storyteller.
Here are some ways to support or get involved in what happens here:
1 – leave a comment even if it’s just a smile
2 – let me mail or email you happy things
3 – reach out or share freely
4 – buy my book
5 – donate in any amountAnd if all you can do is read, please know that it means the most.
You and your story are welcome here, and you are loved.