One Million Tiny Things

Casabella Edwards

Ma,
Last night, I told the stars about you. They sparkled in the night sky as if they agreed with me. Agreed about your perfection. Agreed that with your kind heart and selfless mind, you were by far the best thing that had happened to me.

They reminded me that these twinkling little lights are fiery balls of fire somewhere. And just like that, although, I can't see your sparkle anymore, I know in my heart that you're watching me from somewhere too.

And everyday, I hope, that I've made you proud.

I may not have grown up on the way everybody else did, but, you sure as hell made it a whole lot more special.

I'm nothing spectacular. With my unruly curls and broken specs, I put the average in average. A young run-away with nobody to call mum or dad, a girl with no home, no family and no love either gotten or given. But you, a young college drop-out trying to make it on the big screens, didn't hesitate to take me in.

You were awesome at making me feel like the heroine in one of your swashbuckler films. Like I was the one wielding the sword and the power. Like I could be anything I wanted.

You believed that too, didn't you?

That it was upto us who we were, who we are and who we became.

I grew up watching you, copying you, learning from you and to be honest you taught me a lot.

To persevere
To love
To joke
And most of all, to never give up

You'd been trying out for films your whole life. I remember you telling me that your first audition was when you were 13.

You spoke of that day often. You told me how you walked up that stage full of confidence. You were defying all the rules that had caged you all your life. You were finally free.
But, your success story didn't start there. The way other people saw it, your success never started. They say that you never made it to your peak and that you wasted your life on your silly hopes and dumb wishes.

That day, you'd tripped on air in the middle of the stage and clumsily fallen on your face. Getting back up, your lipstick had smeared everywhere and people in the audience had begun to laugh at you. But, gearing up whatever courage you had left in you, you managed to say your lines. You acted everything out. You tried your hardest.

But, the part wasn't yours at the end of the day.

Every dip, every fall, every "try again someday", you took it all in good humour. You almost never got disheartened. And that is something that I'll always admire you for. Something that I wish I had as well. Your endless ability to get right back on your feet, no matter how many times the floor gave way under you.

People used to ask if your films took a lot out of me. We were constantly on the move, I never had a specific place to grow up in. And, sometimes I wonder what it would have been like to own a house, to stay in one town, to go to one school, walk down the same roads and know the bus times; to call one single place "home".

My friends used to ask me if I hated you. For never giving me time to live, for never staying long enough for acquaintances to become friends, for never having anything permanent.

I never could hate you.

Home was never a place for me. Home was you.

Your smile every morning whether the sun rose over a caravan or hotel room.

Your pancakes from kitchens that weren't always ours.

Dancing to music from the radio in the shine of the headlights, down abandoned roads and run down motels.