Life Appreciation · Stories and reasons
Come read the many reasons people have shared — family, friends, joy, kindness, and the everyday moments that make living so big. Then share your reason, so someone else can find a little more light in theirs.
1,074 stories16+ years of stories559 voices
1,074 stories · page 6 of 54
My eleven-year-old niece entered the regional robotics fair with a robot she built from a kit, a shoebox, two old phone chargers and her grandfather's broken desk lamp. Its only job was to water a houseplant when the soil got dry.
Dear me,
Our town library started a seed library this spring: little wooden drawers full of seed packets that anyone can "check out." The idea is that you grow the plant, let some of it go to seed and bring seeds back for others.
My partner and I have a weekend hobby: reading the little plaques on park benches. You'd be amazed at what people put on them.
After a huge storm in January, my teenage sons decided to build a snowman taller than our house. I told them it was impossible. They took that personally.
On a solo day off in October, I walked into the old carousel building in the park and bought a ticket. Just for me. No kids. Two dollars.
My grandfather took me to my first baseball game in 1998. This summer, I took him back to the same stadium for his ninetieth birthday.
Our street had never had a block party. Somebody had to start it, so I put flyers in every mailbox and hoped for the best.
On a warm June night at my parents' farmhouse, my kids caught fireflies in a mason jar, the same way I did when I was their age, on the same lawn.
At the Saturday farmers market, there's a woman who sells bread from a little cart: sourdough, rye, a seeded loaf, and a cinnamon swirl that sells out by nine. Everyone calls her "the Bread Lady."
At a garage sale in June, I found a box of old vinyl records for ten dollars. Inside was a record with a handwritten label: "Mom and Dad's Wedding Song, 1962." It was a 45 of "Can't Help Falling in Love."
My grandfather shined shoes outside the train station in Philadelphia for thirty-one years. When I was little, he'd let me sit on the little stool next to him on Saturdays and hand him the brushes.
My ugly Christmas sweater was knitted by my great-aunt Phyllis in 1991. It has a reindeer with a pom-pom nose, three-dimensional snowflakes, and a strip of tinsel sewn along the collar that sheds like a cat.
My daughter, who is nine, came home from school in Auckland one day and said "Kia ora, Mum" and then taught me five words of te reo Māori she'd learned that day.
Our tortoise, Gus, turned fifty this year. He came with the house. The previous owners left him with a note: "He likes strawberries and being left alone."
My husband has been fishing on the same lake for fifty years. This summer, our five-year-old grandson, Eli, came with him for the first time.
My father retired this spring and decided to drive across the country alone in his old pickup truck. My sister and I were nervous. He was thrilled.
My son is four, and he laughs constantly. I started writing down what made him laugh, because I never want to forget.
After prom this year, my daughter and eight of her friends came back to our house at midnight in their dresses and suits, starving. I'd promised pancakes.
On the first Saturday of every month, our volunteer fire department serves an all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast for five dollars. It's the most popular event in town, and I've been going since I was a kid.
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