The Little and the Big Things (and how I love them)

1) My mother is a beautiful woman. She'll offer to help me study even after a long shift at work. Sometimes, when we're talking on the phone, I can hear the steady strokes of her paintbrush as she works steadily at the house. I am more than thankful to her. Honestly, I don't know how to repay her. I can only try.

2) I sleep with many blankets, and when I wake from a nightmare, I clutch at them just so I can feel something soft. They've saved me many nights.

3) My cat is huge and named Gizmo. When I finally put down my book and roll over to sleep, he starts to purr and curls up beside me. His fur is soft and fluffy and he has the most perfect blue eyes I've ever seen. Sometimes, when he's sleepy, he runs facefirst into walls and looks offended when I laugh. He's a cat, of course, so he knows I love him, just not how much.

4) I appreciate my heart. I know I've put the poor thing through enough stress. Hearts are complex and incredible things, all electrical potential and contractility and cardiac muscle with intercalated discs and gap junction and perfect synchronization, even when the humans they belong to seem to be doing everything in their power to wear them out young. Thanks, heart, for keeping on beating. I wouldn't have.

5) I'm grateful to myself. I'm thankful to the girl who hated herself so much she couldn't breathe at night for learning to, if nothing else, tolerate herself. For letting herself relax and love people around her and maybe even like certain things about herself, if she's in a particularly good mood. For keeping going even when inside sources tell me she really wanted to stop.