I have a favorite feeling...

I am a person who deals with favorites a lot.  I like to know what people enjoy and it helps me realize who they are...What is your favorite movie?  Your favorite Book?  If you could go anywhere where would you go?  Who is your favorite singer?  What is your comfort food?  You happiest memory?...it is in these questions that a person lets you beneath their skin, beneath the persona they are trying to portray and into who they really are.

As I have thought about this I realized that I have a lot of favorites in my life but they are favorites not because of what they are, rather it is because of the feeling they evoke in me.  I have a favorite feeling.  It is summer thunderstorms and open windows.  It is walking barefoot in the garden and the taste of a tomato fresh from the vine.  It is the smell of a roast cooking and a table set for company.  It is the quiet of a house where everyone is napping and nothing needs to get done.  It is the sound of lawnmowers and rainbirds, of falling leaves being blown down the street.  It is yard sale signs and the first sip of a cold soda.  It is pumpkins on porches and an old flag blowing in the breeze.  It is the smell of fireworks, of campfires lingering on your clothes, of geraniums.  It is in small town parades and salt water taffy.  It is the moment when you finish a great book and don't want to return to the real world just yet, but you want to stay with those characters you have grown to love.  It is in the curtains that dance in an unexpected breeze.  It is in an open road ready for an adventure.  It is the silence of slow moving streams where the only sound is of your paddle pushing against the water.  It is crisp evenings where crickets play you their song and the night sky awaits with a quilt of stars.  It is the sight of fruit stands full of bushel baskets teaming with fruit.  It is when you see missionaries on the street or when you hear your dad singing off key in priesthood meeting.  It is the press of hands on your head and words spoken from our Heavenly Father.  It is the arms wrapping around you in a tight embrace so familiar and so known.  Yes, I have a favorite feeling.