The Small Things

By Laura Buonanno, FSU Florence Program Coordinator

When I was 12, my parents bought me a new mountain bike, and I would spend my afternoons after school exploring our neighborhood. I would cycle nowhere in particular, but I always found different areas that I had never seen before on any of our family walks. There were creeks, woods, and fields undiscovered and all within walking (or biking) distance of my house.

These past few weeks, under quarantine rule, I can’t help but feel as if I’ve been brought back to my exploring days.

We are not supposed to go far from our house if we do venture out at all, and although I don’t have any dogs to take out for a walk, I do have 2 children. We’re so lucky to have a beautiful field behind our house that is vast, full of flowers, trees and a few benches. In the distance, we can see a crop of old villas in the hills, overlooking the field.

I’ve lived here, in this area of town, for about 5 years now, but I’ve never really lived it until now.

Mornings are now spent getting the kids breakfast, getting homework done and out of the way for that day, and then taking them out to the field to run around a bit. We’ve found new corners, hidden benches, beautiful budding dogwood trees, and so many different flowers scattered everywhere. We take a frisbee, a soccer ball, or nothing at all and just walk through: the field is not a park, so without any slides or jungle gyms to climb on we are left to our imaginations. My son loves to cover every area we hadn’t covered the day before, and we always find something new. I’m fascinated by the crumbling wall facing the field and how old it must be. There is another area with a magnolia tree that has various nests and birds chirping from every direction and who knows what else living underneath it. My daughter loves finding new flowers and picking as many as possible. Each day she comes back with different bouquets of buttercups, bluebells and daisies. The flowers not falling out of her small hands are overflowing from her pockets and we make flower necklaces and crowns with them.

Lately, with the grass gone uncut, the field has become even more beautiful. Walking through this week with my children, the sun shone down on us and we all held hands as we headed towards our favorite bench underneath a dogwood tree. The wind was blowing and the field became an undulating sea full of waves moving back and forth. No one was out and all we heard were birds chirping and a constant hum of bees in the dogwood tree. My daughter looked up at me and smiled, and I thought,

She’s creating a memory in this moment.

There is so much beauty to be seen in everyday things that are right under our nose, and so many times our busy schedules get in the way of us stopping to appreciate the small things. These past few weeks have forced us all to slow down a bit and to look around, and for that I’m grateful.