number: firefly

I think that I'm becoming very sentimental these days.

Maybe it's because school is starting- and I'm not going back.

Maybe it is that fall is coming...I get pensive in the fall.

So, here's a pensive moment I've been having lately:

I've been thinking about the summers and how my sister and I used to travel to Shelbyville, TN

for a week every summer to visit our grandparents.

There we would fatten ourselves on s'mores poptarts, Graddaddy's sugar free ice cream bars, and sit on the couch watching wholesome television like "The Angry Beavers" and "Hey Dude" all while participating in minimal physical exertion- we were like two baby larva growing in size and laziness over a week's time.

*some of you smart mouths are thinking 'fat off sugar free stuff?! you guys must have been really fat!' I will smack that mouth! but seriously, you're right- we totally were. actually, not lindsay...just me. pictures of that to come in the near future*

Besides getting larger in our bellies and our sassiness, I also remember every night Granddaddy & Gradmother would hand us a mason jar with holes poked out in the top of it.

We would then run around the yard chasing any flickering light that passed us. This was to give us our "physical activity" for the day since we were two little lard buckets.

*One time Lindsay got really into it and chased a car down the road thinking it was a large firefly.

She's very pretty. Just not the brightest firefly if you get what I mean.*

I totally just lied. That never happened.

I love those memories. We would run around the yard hoping that maybe this time we would

catch enough fireflies to be our night light. Or maybe they could be our pets. Or maybe we

could keep them FOREVER!!!

*I know, shocker: my sister and I were dramatic children.*

Grandmother and Granddaddy would patiently explain to us that the fireflies would not make it in the jar. We had to set them free. So, we did.

Grandmother would always say things like, "Don't you want to let them free and see how pretty they are outside of the jar?"

Honestly, I did not.

I thought, "Hey lady, I just ran around the yard for this!"

*I told you, sassy.*

I wanted my fireflies in my jar.

But in actuality she was right, they were just as beautiful outside of the jar as they were inside of it.

I must say every time I see a firefly I think of my grandparents and Shelbyville.

The change of summer to fall does always make me a little sad and apprehensive.

Maybe it is because I am growing up and it is apparently obvious at this time of year.

Or maybe it is because I miss my grandparents terribly and the fireflies are a way I can still think of and love their memory.

I'm tellin' you guys...pensive...what will we do?!

But a little pensiveness never hurt anybody...right?

...until next time...