I Found Love in a Heart-Shaped Place

What we dream of at Little Utopia.

I am often negative, cynical and bitter in a young life that already feels old. I am disappointed by broken promises regarding education and labor, and the fears of my past hold me hostage. But change is coming, because last Friday, I found love in the shape of a pizza.

I always find love in the shape of a pizza, whenever I eat a pizza, and the love washes over me in even greater fennel-scented waves whenever that pizza is gluten-free, as it is in that never-disappointing Pizza Fusion pie. But this pie was different, because it was a Valentine’s Day, heart-shaped pie ordered in advance for me by a man who scrambles to iron his clothes 30 minutes prior to a big job interview (so … not a big planner).

And when I was eating my protein-heavy salad yesterday (back on The Paleo!), maybe it was the endorphins pumping through my brain from my lunch break workout (Paleo!), but I thought of the love in that pizza, and I was suddenly overwhelmed by the simple luxury of my life. I may hate my job, but it’s a luxury to even have a job, and I may hate that my degree(S!) have yielded only soft, virtually unmarketable skills, but oh how lucky I am to have an education in a world where nearly half of the global population of women do not have basic literacy skills! My little-foresighted boyfriend and I may not be able to afford more than a pizza for a Valentine’s Day dinner, but we live in the lap of luxury, and having a support system that includes him is the biggest luxury of all.

We hear about the value of “simple things” but only now am I internalizing this truth for myself. Thank God for small pleasures. If for one minute, for one day, I can remember this, then for today, that itself is enough to be thankful for.

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Laura Creel (@Little_Utopia) is the managing editor of Little Utopia.