What’s Priceless to You?

"When my daughter tells me the kinds of things you would only share with your best friend."
-Vicki, 60

"Visiting a friend I hadn't seen in a year and showing up wearing the same outfit - a reminder we're still on the same wavelength even if we're not on the same coast."
-Jean, 49

"Hanging out with someone who likes yellow and green Skittles so we can share a bag and not waste any."
-Anna,23

"Taking my son to a carnival. It's hot, everyone is bumping into each other, the prices are outrageous, and there are huge lines for food, but then you finally find a tiny spot where you can squeeze a few inches to sit with your child and eat disgusting hot dogs, and at that moment, your child turns to you and says, 'Isn't this the best?!' And suddenly it's all worth it."
-Julie, 44

"That once-a-year call from one of my kids where they're not asking me for something."
-Louise, 65

"Walking into my garden in the middle of the night to smoke and getting hit over the head with the scent of night-blooming jasmine."
-Adam, 83

"When I let my dog off leash at the park. I watch her play with the other dogs for about 15 minutes, and then I call her name and she stops whatever she is doing, whoever she is playing with, and runs like a racehorse back to me, sits and waits for me to put her leash on."
-Joanie, 41

"A glass of whisky and a pretty girl."
-Flint, 31

"Going through my memory box when I moved recently and finding things long forgotten but saved, including letters sent from camp, report cards, and stories my kids and my niece wrote in school. They make me laugh and cry."
-Nancy, 66

"I'm trying to learn German. It's pretty priceless when I can actually understand anything anyone says in that language, especially if it is in the past tense."
-Ian, 27

"Wearing sunglasses so dark they'd be illegal if they were car windows."
-Chelsea, 22

"Those gross pictures and videos of the birth of my kids where they are covered in slime and screaming. For some reason, they make me smile and cry at the same time. Looking at them brings back not just the memory of that moment, but they invoke more than that. They seem to encompass the whole feeling of 'becoming.' Becoming a person, becoming a mother, becoming a family."
-Bobbie, 43

"When a king salmon strikes your bait like you just snagged a tugboat."
-Jamie, 30

"Boy smell."
-Purva, 29

"Having a friend's 9-year-old - who is already a lot taller than me - still want to sit in my lap."
-Vivienne, 49

"When my friend called to ask me if she could stop by because she was eating 'the most delicious pear' and wanted to share it with me."
-Amanda, 26

"My little brother, and the fact that he's called me every single day for the last 35 years just to say hello."
-Beatrice, 92

 

Posted on March 27, 2006