This morning, I buttered my toasted bagel and decided life might be okay after all. I wore my favorite necklace and took the time to curl my eyelashes. I played music from the car speakers and felt nostalgia instead of desolation when my old favorite song came on. 

Sometimes, a specific object or entity will call out to me. I’ll type it in my notes app and tell myself to write a column about it. Little things that suddenly spark sophisticated ideas and poetic metaphors. Once I finally have time to write, it’s gone, but the aftermath of random jots is a spectacle. Today, it was my bagel, which caused me to forego completing my economics homework and instead write this column. 

I’m not even sure what I want to say. All I know is that life is beautiful, and I probably won’t feel this way in an hour, so I must seize the chance to accurately depict the rare shard of overwhelming gratitude and altruism I’m feeling.

Time seems to define my life, whether I want it to or not. My focus naturally shifts between the past, present, and future. I count down the days until the next ‘thing’ I’m looking forward to, and I obsess over pictures of my most treasured memories. I’ve memorized the overarching color schemes that define the months I’ve lived. In times of hopelessness, I look to the colors to epitomize a brighter future.

It’s almost summer, and I can feel it in the air. Even in the 40° weather, it creeps up on me as I wear shorts to school knowing the high is 80°. I’ve taken more pictures of the sky in the past week than in my entire life because, suddenly, every shade of blue is irresistibly alluring and provides a fresh sense of clarity. My motivation blooms with the flowers. 

I always think seasonal depression doesn’t really affect me, then the season ends. Then, I can hear the birds, and I can roll the car windows down, and I’m encompassed by luscious green trees and grass. Everything shifts into focus, and I question what was inhibiting me from changing sooner. 

How is it that something as basic as a bagel ignites the ability to write 500 words about how beautiful life is? Is there something fundamentally causing the flow of the paragraphs written out in the tranquility of the drifting clouds? Or am I just so overwhelmed with exam dates and review guides that the simplicity of breakfast in the morning refreshes me to the point of revitalization?

If I were a better writer, maybe I’d try to turn this bagel into some extended metaphor that encapsulates my entire life and all of society simultaneously. I don’t even know how I’d go about that, but I do know that the school year is almost over, and summer is so close that I can taste it in the butter spread across my bagel.