I carried the flowers from the shop to the car like I was smuggling kindness home

Dear Delyara, They weren’t expensive. That’s part of why I bought them. If they’d been extravagant, I would have talked myself out of them. But they were small enough to justify and bright enough to matter, and for a moment I wanted one thing in the house that was not useful, not edible, not necessary, not chosen around anyone else’s needs. Just beautiful. I put them on the table and felt better than I wanted to admit. Maybe because beauty without function feels almost rebellious in my life now. Maybe because I needed proof that I could still choose something just because it softened the room.