What makes you smile?

I was thinking about smiling today and remembered a list I had created when I was 18 of things that didn’t just make me happy, but things that had actually caused me to physically break into a grin at some point in time if not every time I encounter it. I’ve always thought that if smiling were impossible my face would crack. Here’s the list (in no way complete) that I came up with 6-7 years ago of things that had made me smile:

☺ Christmas music (especially when it’s no where near Christmas)

☺ seeing the yellow notice outside my classroom canceling class for the day

☺hearing a favorite song come on the radio

☺flannel sheets on a cold night

☺good/happy music

☺seeing someone else smile

☺friends and cousins

☺chocolate

☺smell of fog

☺hearing a friend sing

☺remembering an interesting dream

☺anything and everything, but nothing in particular

☺little kids

☺feeling the spirit

☺hearing music with memories behind it

☺hearing children sing

☺swinging

☺riding on a rollercoaster

☺reading one of Eric’s (my younger brother) letters

☺getting a letter from a friend I haven’t seen in a long time

☺feeling happy

☺when things unexpectedly go well or change for the better

☺when I realize Heavenly Father has answered a prayer or given me something I asked for (or didn’t ask for)

☺Hearing the phone ring when I’m expecting a call (depending on who I’m expecting a call from!)

☺receiving a blessing

☺liking what I see in the mirror

☺realizing how sad I must look when I’m not smiling

☺hearing the rain fall outside while I’m in my warm bed

☺thinking of things that make me smile

☺hearing laughter

☺g-ma’s “evil eye”

☺oldies music

☺absolute silence in a group of friends/people when it’s not common

☺fun socks

☺seeing someone willing to help another

☺hearing g-ma tell stories from when she was young

☺meeting someone new

☺walking out of my last class on a Friday afternoon

☺giving a gift the other person really enjoys

☺realizing how much certain people care about me

☺hearing a compliment or something nice about me when the other person isn’t aware that I’m within hearing range

☺when someone says, “don’t smile”

☺having the hiccups when I’m trying to talk to someone

☺getting a good grade on a test when I wasn’t expecting one (actually- to edit this I smiled
when I got a good grade on anything whether I was expecting it or not)

☺seeing the way gay people act

☺Kim’s destressitizing breathing exercises

☺when the wind blows and hits me just right

☺bubbles

It once was lost but now is found

Spring semester in 2007 required purchase of this massive red book titled Medical Surgical Nursing. It cost a pretty penny, somewhere around 130 bucks I think. When I say massive, I mean massive. This wasn’t a book you’d take to class with you unless you were looking to get some muscle toning action to incorporate into your walk around campus. In fact, when I had bought it (along with a few other hefty texts) I was sore the next day from lugging it the mile to my car since I parked off campus just across the street at the LDS institute building. I hated paying so much for a book, even if it was of a significant size, but I accepted the price by figuring I could divide it by two since we were using it again the next semester which made it reasonable. I was happy that there would be one less expensive book to buy that upcoming semester even if in the long run it averaged out from the crazy cost of books the semester before. I was still happy I wouldn’t have to buy another super expensive ginormous dead tree.

With the end of the semester I went home to Antioch for the next 3 months. I brought Big Red with me, just in case I felt like perusing it to keep me from forgetting important nursing information over the summer break. Of course I never even cracked it open, but there was something comforting seeing it on the table in my room everyday and knowing it was there if I had wanted to. There it stayed untouched, yet clearly visible on the corner of my long table next to my doorway all summer long.

August was coming to a close and it was time for me to get ready to go back to Sacramento. I didn’t notice when it was exactly Big Red had disappeared, but when I was packing up my things it was not on my table. A DVD a friend had lent me that I had placed on top of Big Red went AWOL as well. I searched everywhere I could think to look for that book and the DVD. We came to the conclusion that somebody must have stolen it-nobody in our house had touched them and there wasn’t any other reason for them to be gone from their normal spot. My parent’s house was up for sale at this time and on most Sundays while we were at church and other random days a realtor would have an open house showing the house to people. We just couldn’t figure out how they managed to walk out of the house with that massive book unseen…in summer no less when big puffy jackets (that wouldn’t have covered the bulk of that book anyway) weren’t worn.

I thought, maybe, just maybe I really hadn’t seen it on my table all summer and left it in my room in West Sacramento and I left the DVD somewhere else. I could not imagine someone stealing them! Alas, ‘twas not so. Upon return to my room at my grandma’s house in West Sac I found what I already knew but couldn’t understand. The book and DVD remained mysteriously vanished. I wound up having to buy a replacement DVD for the one that was lent to me, and buying another Big Red book. Gaahh! It was most disappointing and very frustrating.

Fast forward to May 2, 2009 in the evening. My dad walked into the family room holding a large rectangular shape in front of him. What was that? The lights were dim and all I could see were some words reflecting the small amount of light it was catching. At first I thought it was a trivial pursuit game box. What is that? He kept holding it in front of him and said, “Look what I found!” I peered closer. Oh my goodness! That boxy looking rectangular form my dad was holding said “Medical Surgical Nursing Clinical Management for Positive Outcomes 7th edition” on it!!

“Where did you find that??” We were so sure it had been stolen. The whole family had looked everywhere for it that summer in 2007. I even looked at my Aunt’s house I had gone to when I knew I didn’t bring it there in case I did and forgot (I had brought it there on other occasions in the past).

He said he thinks someone had played a trick on us, because it was on the lowest shelf on the bookcase in their room behind a row of other books in front of it so you couldn’t see it by looking at the bookcase front on unless you pulled out the books that were on that shelf in front of it. The books on that shelf were not used (obviously) and stayed there for almost 2 years until my dad was cleaning it out and reorganizing it tonight and ta daaaa. There was Big Red. I guess some kid or strange adult who went through one of our open houses that summer hid it from me. I can’t believe it was in the house the whole time. What a weird hiding place, yet genius. Hiding a book on a book case in a room it didn’t belong in behind other books.

I asked if he’d found the DVD too. Nope, that one is still gone but now I’m thinking I should check my little brother’s shelves in his closet for it. He’s been gone in Brazil for almost the last 2 years and I don’t think anybody’s been through that closet much- I wouldn’t be surprised if I found it somewhere in there.