She opened the utensils drawer and the messy content of knives, forks, spoons, chopsticks, all sizes, shapes and materials crumbled together made her smile with tender memories.
She remembered the perfectly aligned silverware drawer at her brother's house. Everything sorted by type and size. She remembered the perfectly organized pantry, where every can had its place, every box was within reach and no bags left without a proper container.
She wasn't ashamed of her inability to organize her things or how unkempt her house was. She knew that every time she looked at her pantry or utensils, her heart would feel warm with the memories of her brother and his family, the long talks around the kitchen table when she was visiting with them, and all the wisdom they shared. It was a constant reminder of how much she needed them to keep in touch, to stay close.
This thought made her wonder of all these little things that keep impressions of the loved ones in her soul because it's not the big gestures that leave an impression on the soul. For the soul is like a very thin tissue paper that is easily destroyed by big actions. Only small things written gently on it can be further read again and again.
The big things are planned, are revisited all the time, are reconstructed by our memories, but the little things don't need rework, they fit as they were absorbed and they keep their place undisturbed inside of our brains. We don't manipulate them, they become icons, that concentration of meaning and action.
From all the huge achievements of her father, that hero praised by so many people, her most dear memory was that hug, from that frail man that was about to die. The sound vignette from the radio station calling the morning news, the image of him sitting with is legs crossed, the fedora straw hat that he used when taking them to the beach. Little things that she could revisit in her memories at any time and they would always reveal themselves in their purest semiotic value.
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