I grew up on a farm in a small town in Iowa. It truly was home to me. My family grew peaches, apples, and strawberries. Each morning I’d go to pick a peach to eat. In the afternoon when the sun would reach the highest point in the sky I’d grab an apple. Then when the sunsets and the sky was a mixture of colors, I would eat strawberries and waited for the sun to go down. Then night would come and blackness would surround me. Except for the silver shining stars that lit up the way back to the house.
Waking up to that summer sweetness right outside my window, I can’t resist it. Going outside in the morning with the refreshing air against me. I take the winding path that is surrounded by trees of all different kinds. In the end of the path though is where my park is at. When I was little my family put swings at the end of the path so I could play on them. But today was a different day because when I got there, someone was already there.
It was soon to be my best friend though we didn’t know that at the moment. For right now it was just Lily, she helped pick the fruit in the summer and sell it. I never talked to her until that day and I regret that.

We started to talk and since then I would wake up every morning, walk down the winding path, and talk to Lily. Or sometimes not talk at all. We were best friends in a way hard to describe. Lily was definitely different. She gave advice and hardly complained. When I had a problem she would help me get through it. Though that’s what’s best friends do, Lily did her part then.

There was something else about her that I never would quite understand. She would smile, all the time. Each morning I saw her she shone her white teeth and she actually meant to smile too. She was filled with her own joy or something. After talking to her every day, I found out she had more enough things to complain about. And here she was smiling.

So the next day I asked her, “Lily, how can you smile so much?” and her reply was one that got me the most. It made me think daily about it. She said “because I’m so glad to be living, and smiles never fade.”

That happened four years ago at least, and I can still remember that morning like no other. I can’t help but think that she was right. You should be so glad to be alive and a smile never fades. Lily’s smile is never forgotten in my memory, and because of her and her saying, I can smile a lot more often, and I mean it.