like blankets

 We sat around the fire telling the kids stories about when they were littler. They were thrilled to be up late, in the dark, talking around the fire pit together. We told story after story - some just little snippets and glimpses - and their eyes would flicker with recognition and they'd croon, "Yeaaaaah.... I remember that!"

"Let's keep talking about remembers," she said, perched upright and eager in her mini-camping chair.

Those stories wrapped them up like blankets, layers of comfort and security and belonging. Who doesn't relish discovering who they are and where they've been, learning how the people we love the most see us through the stories they remember and tell, feeling just how much we belong to and with the people who make up the stuff of which our stories are made.

when i see you, the world stops.

When I see you, the world. It stops and all that exists for me is you and my eyes staring at you. There’s nothing else. No noise, no other people, no thoughts or worries, no yesterday, no tomorrow. The world just stops and it’s a beautiful place and there’s only you. Just you. And my eyes staring at you. When you’re gone, the world starts again and I don’t like it as much. I can live in it, but I don’t like it. I just walk around in it, and wait to see you again and wait for it to stop again. I love it when it stops. It’s the best thing I’ve ever known or ever felt, the best thing, and that, is why I love just to stare at you.