It’s Saturday; that means it’s time for another post from our Resident Author, Taylor Anne Vigil! Today Taylor’s giving us a peek into her soul, courtesy of her computer, this website, and a whole bunch of internet connections.
Out of curiosity – and no pressure on you at all – what sort of posts from Taylor do you most enjoy?
Some of you may wonder how I stay so positive in times of great hardship. You might be surprised to learn my secret: like every other human being, all I do is breathe.
My breathing is different from yours, perhaps. Taking in a deep breath is enough to bring a smile to my face. Most people don’t think about breathing. They never take notice of how this involuntary action keeps us alive.
So many souls are taken from this world without reason. This is what hits me when I take a deep breath.
My thoughts drift. To my cousin, Sammy, whose breaths left him quickly after being hit by a car at just eleven years of age…
To my great grandmother, who’s breaths were taken slowly after a long battle with Cancer and Dementia…
Even to complete strangers…
To the couple who were killed in a crash near my grandparents’ house on Thanksgiving morning…
To the millions of people who are dying of Alzheimer’s, starvation, false imprisonment, homelessness and many other tragedies at this very moment…
The act of breathing reminds me of the preciousness of life, but it also reminds me of this:
“That could have been me, but it wasn’t.”
It is that thought and that thought alone which keeps me calm, keeps me going, because when I breathe, I know I am still here to do the things I plan to do, to help and heal others and inspire them with writing.
My vision may be trying to fail me, but as long as I am breathing, I will always be smiling.
I will write an autobiography someday and when I do, it will have the perfect title for me:
“I Smile When I Breathe”
