Cloudy with a 100% Chance of Smiles

It feels great to be up in the air again, to watch the clouds, for a short period of time from above--rather than below; to see the world--the most beautiful canvas that there is just full of opportunity for growth and life.

A lot of people don't like to fly in planes. I love it. It's the one time I can disappear and enjoy a brand new outlook--a new view--a new perspective. It's one of the few times I can disconnect from all outside wires of communication--and access only myself.

Solsbury Hill comes on my iPod, and I smile. I love this--this freedom--this beautiful-eye-opening freedom.

I close my eyes, "my heart going boom, boom, boom." I've been to this place before, THIS place, way up high. Not just when I am literally in a plane, but every-time I close my eyes and get lost in my favorite place.

I've always had an obsession with the sky. When I was young, the trim to my room was the blue sky and clouds. I didn't want it any other way. I was stubborn. In 7th grade sewing class, when we were asked to buy patterns for the pillows we'd later be making, I chose the fabric at the store that had a sky print. When people ask me if I could have any power in the world--that's easy--flying.

I close my eyes, and I am on a cloud. It's simple and soft. I use it like Aladdin's magic carpet, until I want a new view--Then I just pop on over to another cloud. I float over New York City, and then somehow teleport myself to my hometown--and time travel to when I was in high school. I watch my mother out in the yard-and see my friends and me playing sports at the high school.

I breathe it in. I breathe it all in.

I feel myself smile, and then I let out a little laugh. I feel my eyes twitch. I am present, but yet so far gone. This is what it means to go to my favorite place in the entire world--to feel present--and away...to know that this place, this amazing ride through the sky is simply one ME moment away-that I can take off any time I want.

I come back to myself and where I am. This time I am lucky enough that when I open my eyes--I am still up in the sky--still up above the clouds--still smiling.

In plane flights, in paychecks, in good times, in cappuccino...how do you measure a year?

Five hundred twenty-five thousand

Six hundred minutes…

How do you measure, measure a year?

In plane flights, in paychecks, in good times

In cappuccino?

In choices, in smiles, in laughter, in love…

Five hundred twenty-five thousand

Six hundred minutes

Five hundred twenty five thousand

Journeys to have…

It's hard to say how quickly a year goes by. 12 months. 52 weeks. 365 days. Fast. Slow. On repeat.

365 days to make an impact. 365 days to experience change. 365 days to make a difference. 365 days to live from one memorable moment to the next. I often find that I can't measure my moments by my years in my age, because I find the truest and most wonderful moments to be those I don't expect, and don't plan. I find the spectacle of life in being most truly beautiful in the spontaneity of living it without knowing--without seeing what's next--without having an eight ball to say it will all be okay.

I may appear differently to people, always planning, always scheming my future, but it is in the decisions I make on whim that have made most of my life it's own spectacle. It has been in the decisions that I have made to take chances and risks that have made me incredibly grateful for the years behind me, and the years that I can see ahead.

It has been 12 months/52 weeks/365 days since I packed my bags, boarded a plane, woke up in a different time zone, and stumbled across cobblestone with a backdrop of the Tuscan landscape. It has been one year since I moved to Italy...since I took a leap, made a jump, and landed on my own two feet with no regrets.

It has been a year of meeting people, a year of leaving negativity behind, a year of saying goodbye, a year of fresh starts, humble endings, and letting go; it has been a year of traveling, a year of exploring far off destinations, a year of believing in myself and every choice; it has been a year of beginnings, a year of risk taking, a year of fine-tuning; it has been a year of pushing others, a year of reaching out; a year of living. it has been a year of forging ahead, a year of discovering what I truly want--a year of finding who I truly am.

It has been a year of seeing that even if our initial plans don't follow through, there's always something else standing by, ready to take us in it's arms, accept us, and warm us back up to our positive glow.

On November 5, 2010, I believed that on November 5, 2011 I would still be standing on the cobblestone, sipping on cappuccino, and living with a beautiful Italian man in a castle (okay maybe a bit of an exaggeration)...but I did believe I would still be in Italy making a life of my own there. But I was wrong. I am not in Italy...I am not in Europe. I am back in New York City, where I first moved to on a whim, nearly two years ago. I have been home for three times as long as I spent in Italy. For those of you that don't want to do the math--that means I have been home for 9 months. And what I have found is that while Italy made me happy, New York has made me feel home. I should have known this in the arguments over the greatest city in the world, while I lived in Rome. I should have known this after I heard Alicia Keys second version of Empire State of Mind--and cried. I should have known this from the start. But it is in the decisions we make--and the experiences that we have--that we can have those moments of clarity--those moments of beauty when our minds and our hearts meet in the middle and finally match--and those moments of certainty of what we want and where we want to be.

I know what I want--and where I want to be. I know who I am--and what I want to do. Most of all I know that this last year isn't the last good year...No. It's just the start.

But this year I am not going to measure...I am just going to live (of course--one cappuccino at a time).

Wedding Bells--Wedding Bells--Wedding all the way

Some days, you wake up, you brush your teeth, you turn on the hot water, and you go through the motions. And some days, you wake up, you brush your teeth, you turn on the hot water, and you smile about what's ahead, what possibilities the day may have, and even what possibilities the future may have.

This is the experience that I had on the day following my brother's wedding in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio. Beaming with happiness, Ted and Katie walked down the aisle together as Mr. and Mrs. Segal at nearly 4:45. Their arms were linked in one another's and their smiles extended past the end of the longest pew. Nothing was going to come between them on this lovely, beautiful day that provided an abundance of sunshine, and scenery.

The ceremony, the reception, and the after-party all reminded me of a song that I recently heard at a songwriter's night down at the Duplex in New York. The man sang of how he hoped his wedding day, which was a pretty glorious day, was actually going to be the worst day of his life, so that all the moments afterwards were ones he could only look forward to with joy in his heart. And he's right--just think, if a day as good as your wedding day is the worst day of your life, as of forward, then it's going to be a pretty wonderful ride.

I hope like Ted -- and Katie, her parents, my parents, and sister and her husband, I can only find someone to spend that day with.

Here's to love...and weddings...and happiness.

I traded in my light up shoes for a billion light up smiles

“Tag you’re it,” a boy yells as he touches my shoulder on the elementary school playground.

‘Damn,’ I utter in my mind before I continue the game by chasing anyone who I deem slower than me. As my feet touch each patch of dirt, each strand of grass, each piece of the pavement, my white and blue kicks began to blink a red glowing light. The collage of black, green, red, and orange shoes that I chase around also light up the playground in a similar fashion. Eventually, the monkey bars, the red fire truck, and the silver smooth slides have a better light display than Macy’s at Christmas time.

Light up shoes.

I think it was around my ninth birthday that I traded in my light up shoes for a billion light up smiles—when I went from chasing kids and stringing blinking Christmas lights on the four square boxes and dodgeball circles to causing a contagious strands of smiles, ones as big as the acre of land that stretched from the fence of the playground to the back parking lot of the school.

When I was in fourth grade, I won the egg award for my smile. And when I was a freshman in college, the assistant athletic director said to me, “Smile more. You have a wonderful smile.”

I think it was around my sixteenth birthday that I first traded in that light up smile for a look of angst as I became a broody teenager who suddenly thought not smiling was the cool thing to do—who believed that an angry look far exceeded the power of a happy one. I was pretty emo. (Ha)

But near the end of college, like the time I traded in my light up shoes, I found a way to trade back my angst and broodiness for my light up smiles. I found ways to make the Rhode Island athletic fields look like the exterior décor of the Empire State on a clear night—I found a way to light up the world again with that brilliant smile that I once bared in the cafeterias of my elementary and middle schools—on my first day of high school softball practice, and on that last day of high school in which I went from smiley to broody.

As I took a seat on the train, just the other day, a child sat across from me with furry, calf high boots, that blinked that brilliant red light I recognized from the playground. I smiled with each blink the young girl’s boots made. And with my smile—I took a look around the train, and made “smile contact” with a stranger, and just like that a strand of shining smiles began to blink on what would normally be a dull tooth ache of a subway ride. Smiles—the light up shoes of adults.

With each stride I take, I’ve got another smile for another purpose, for another person, for another memory, for another reason. For each step I take I light up from cheek to cheek, and like yawns…it catches. And for that thought, I smile again.

How do you light up the room? Do you have a billion smiles? I bet you a pair of light up shoes that you do.