Things I love about being alive

Beach combing

My husband's hand in mine

Laughing

Birds and flowers

            Wood fires
                                                                                      Poetry  
                                                                                                Jeans and sweaters

Travel
                      Days on the lake
                                                                                                                      Going to the theater.
                                                                                                                    Trains
Listening to music. All kinds of                                                                      music!   

Letters

     Going to Mass

Romantic comedies

Puppies

Dark chocolate and red wine

             Dressing up

                     Glamping

                           Ice cream

Gardens

Little kids

Red Lipstick

Yoga 

Rainy days where you can cuddle up and read all day long.

Cream in my coffee

Room service

Convertibles

The closeness of my family

 
Museums

Radio shows
           Twirling when I dance
English Country decorating
                  Meals with friends

It's good the great green earth to roam,
Where sights of awe the soul inspire;
But oh, it's best, the coming home,
The crackle of one's own hearth-fire!
You've hob-nobbed with the solemn Past;
You've seen the pageantry of kings;
Yet oh, how sweet to gain at last
The peace and rest of Little Things!

Perhaps you're counted with the Great;
You strain and strive with mighty men;
Your hand is on the helm of State;
Colossus-like you stride . . . and then
There comes a pause, a shining hour,
A dog that leaps, a hand that clings:
O Titan, turn from pomp and power;
Give all your heart to Little Things.

Go couch you childwise in the grass,
Believing it's some jungle strange,
Where mighty monsters peer and pass,
Where beetles roam and spiders range.
'Mid gloom and gleam of leaf and blade,
What dragons rasp their painted wings!
O magic world of shine and shade!
O beauty land of Little Things!

I sometimes wonder, after all,
Amid this tangled web of fate,
If what is great may not be small,
And what is small may not be great.
So wondering I go my way,
Yet in my heart contentment sings . . .
O may I ever see, I pray,
God's grace and love in Little Things.

So give to me, I only beg,
A little roof to call my own,
A little cider in the keg,
A little meat upon the bone;
A little garden by the sea,
A little boat that dips and swings . . .
Take wealth, take fame, but leave to me,
O Lord of Life, just Little Things. 

Robert William Service