Little Hands for Little Flowers
FROM MY READING CORNER | 4/3/26
Little Hands for Little Flowers
Thoughts from my reading corner:
I recently watched an interview with actress Olivia Munn. She battled breast cancer previously and discussed with the interviewer how dealing with her illness altered her perspective on how she lives life day to day. I’m paraphrasing, but essentially, she said if she were to wake up at 80 years old and have the ability to go back to a particular time in her life or do it differently, she would come back to this moment. She would throw her phone in the ocean and snuggle, play, and enjoy time with her son. I know it can be difficult to put ourselves in the position of someone who faced death in a more real sense than some of us have. However, her message struck me. There was an urgency in her words. A warning to everyone, that what we think holds extreme importance isn’t quite so when faced with the end. Her words impressed upon me that there is an opportunity to slow down that we oftentimes miss. So, as Ella and I walked home from school, when she asked if she could stop to pick some dandelions, I resisted the urge to say no and instead held out my hand to gently carry the fragile yellow treasures home.
Why are we always in such a hurry?
I’ve been reading Stoicism 101. It’s a book about Stoic philosophers such as Marcus Aralias, the late Roman emperor. It explains what Stoicism is, the different Stoics, and what they believed. It explains it in a way that takes you back to the past, but can be applied to the present. How can we apply Stoic ideals to the way we live our lives day to day? I believe looking at topics from the past and historical references can not only impress upon us how minuscule our present is, but also how small our time here with each other is. Not small in an inconsequential way, because I believe everything we do creates a ripple effect with those around us. But small in a way that our problems or urgencies aren’t as big as our mind convinces us they are. Small in the way that when we are eighty years old, reminiscing about the past, we won’t think about the email we had to send at that exact moment. We won’t be frustrated about a messy home. Instead, we will smile, knowing those little hands that picked little flowers were among the most beautiful moments of our entire lives.
Will we create enough friction in the act of picking up our devices to realize that the important and urgent matters we must deal with are actually our little ones looking at us? The hope in their eyes that this time, we really will be there in “just a second”. The hope that we will see them, that we can’t wait to hold their hand as they stop on the walk to pick a bright yellow dandelion. That just maybe, instead of looking at the dandelion as a weed that infests a beautifully manicured yard, we can see it for what it really is, a flower picked with love. May we embrace the mess of fifteen “flowers” wilting in a cup on the counter and smile as we think back to the moment they were picked and the joy slowing down brought us.
Olivia Munn is right, life is a collection of tiny moments that add up to that life. Make those tiny moments mean something. Make them matter. Hold them with the tenderness that the memory shared will bring to you when you are eighty. I’ll leave you with a quote I underlined while reading the other day from the Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, and Playwright, Seneca the Younger,
“Everyone hustles his life along and is troubled by a longing for the future and weariness of the present. But the man who organized every day as though it were his last, neither longs for nor fears the next day.”
If we try our best to live each day as if it were our last, we can truly focus on what matters most.
Share joy, spread kindness, and as always, happy reading.
-Katie Marie
THE KIDS’ CORNER |
What We Are Reading
Tuck’s Bookshelf: Between the Fly Guy series and Pokémon books we’ve been reading together, I’ll be ready for a solid chapter book break soon.
Ella Bella’s Bookshelf: The kids were gifted a collection of stories in one big book, accurately called The Big Red Book of Beginner Books.
My Bookshelf: I finished The Paris Apartment this week. I’m sure I was late to the game on this one, but I highly recommend it. The author, Lucy Foley, also wrote The Guest List, which I read and loved.
I’m continuing Stoicism 101 by Erick Cloward, Host of the Stoic Coffee Break Podcast.
Tip: Find little ways to incorporate references from stories you read together into everyday life. If something reminds you of a part of a book you read together, it can be a bonding moment to incorporate that memory into a real-life example.
THE CRAFT CORNER |
Blind Date with a Book
The concept: a book is wrapped, and you don’t know what you are about to read until you open it. I plan to try this with the kids this summer by wrapping a few books we have around the house. The act of unwrapping will make it feel exciting and new. You could try this with library books, too.
I actually just opened my first blind date with a book that I purchased from The Story Collective in St. Joseph, MO. In the meantime, I will let you know what I think about my book blind date, Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club, by J. Ryan Stradal, soon.
Until next week.
