No. 44 'Emi' (Smile) — A Place Where It's Okay to Smile

"Smile"

I love this single character.

Recently,
I encountered a very comfortable kind of "smile".

It wasn't that I "smile"d out loud,
nor was it that something was particularly funny.

It was a casual moment spent with family.
It was the usual time returning to my companions.

What was there was a
relaxed, zero-effort "smile".

It was a "smile" that spilled out naturally,
as I felt relaxed and at ease.

That time
quietly healed my heart.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

I love
a "place where it's okay to smile" where I can feel at ease.

There,
feelings of care flow.

Those feelings
become the air,
and "smiles" spill out naturally.

I have been saved many times
by such scenes.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

A place I hold dear
becomes a place someone else holds dear, too.

In that place,
"smiles" spill out naturally once again.

Perhaps,
such a place is...

a place where you can think, with something precious, "I want to live"
...