I'm totally stealing this from my friend Lisa's journal. Her example was lovely and inspiring, and I wanted to try it for myself. I think it will be a cathartic and nostalgic kind of thing, and probably lots of fun. The directions (and another nice example) are here, if anyone else wants to have a go at it. It is much harder than it looks.


I am from all the paper I need to color my dreams upon; from 64 crayolas with a sharpener built into the box, from markers and pens and small hands covered in ink.

I am from the white house on Osage street, the one with deep grass for bare feet and a tree good for climbing and my name carved with love into the sidewalk outside.

I am from my grandmother's lillies, from her irises and roses and hydrangeas pink and blue. From sunflowers that grew much taller than the little girl who planted them with her Papa's help. From lilac trees and tulips and pecans hitting a tin roof like thunder.

I am from Cantrells and Sellars, from Rose and A.V. and a house full of encouragement.

I am from people who embrace life and live without regret.

From copperheads on the playground and that one legendary kid who did a complete 360 on the swings that one time, and everyone swore they saw but nobody remembered who it was.

I am from Right Mindfulness and an eightfold path that I barely keep one foot on. I am from evenings spread out against the sky, like a patient etherized upon a table.

I am from the Old South, from sweet tea and grits and peaches sold on the roadside.

I am from the mystic who caught wild birds. I am from a grandfather who was first an illustrator and then a soldier on a beach in France, and then my hero.

I am from the smell of honeysuckle, from lines drawn or painted or scribbled and shared. From two dollars on every birthday, from red bandanas and mismatched socks and my first pair of all-stars (that are still in my closet, twenty years later). I am from a box full of fairy tales, written and illustrated by a woman who hid them away for me to find when I was grown. I am from a jar full of soil, taken from a place on Osage street where once there was a white house.