begin again

"Share your life, and find the finest joy man can know. Do not be stingy with your heart. Get out of yourself into the lives of others, and new life will flow into you. Share and share alike." 

So maybe fireworks haven't gone off or bells rung or cannons blown for my return. But after a year and a half of bloglessness, I have officially reentered this happy little world and I'M THRILLED. To be honest I'm not exactly sure why I stopped blogging once upon a time - but I just want to thank every single one of my followers for sticking with me through thick and thin even while my blog was one empty boring blank and for your excitement at my return. I love ya'll. This place wouldn't be what it is without you. Hugs distributed. :)

A few things before I begin again. . .

:: I've grown up a bit since my last post in December 2011. I think you'll find Storia a very different place than A Secret Life of Daydreams (er, how many blog titles did I have? Roman Holiday? Ooh La La? The title Storia is permanent, I promise.) I love hearing from people and I demand all you lovely folks try to comment on my blog as often as possible. Oh, of course, everybody's crazy about getting blog comments. But this is why I'm crazy about them: because as I begin again, my blogging goal is not based on getting the hugest following or being the most popular blogger in the history of ever. Quite simply, my goal is to get to know people, hear about their lives, and share a bit of mine in return. If you find anything relateable or even debatable in my posts, let me know - comment! Let's be friends. :) 

:: Also, a small disclaimer. As regard to anything I post on this blog: it's very likely I'll not have the same thought, feeling, or opinion five years from now. I'm constantly changing - the way I write, think, perceive life; constantly developing  sharpening, stretching. So don't hold anything against me in the near future. :) Also, my blog is only a taste of my personal life. There is a lot inside me and in my world and existence that you don't know or ever see. Please don't base you're entire opinion of me from what you read/see on my blog. That's one of the things that bugs me big time about online networking: the insufficiency of truly knowing others, and those who really care vs those who are only curious.

:: Why the name Storia? Storia is the Italian word for story. I'm in love, madly in love with stories. I crave them. I thrive on beautiful words. I clasp books to my chest and act out my favorite parts and find myself breathless too often over my favorite parts. But not just the stories in books, but the stories behind velvet theater curtains and in hometown cinemas and in the songs in my playlist cue and in the stories living and breathing in the people around me. I want to climb into every soul and between the pages and become all of them. And I do, everyday. But I still can't get enough of a good story. So I read them, I write them, I collect them like shells and listen to the sea through their porcelain voices. But the story of my life is my favorite. The word story best describes me, and that's why it's the chosen title for my blog. Here you'll find one fleeting, foggy glance into the looking glass. One flaming shard of a dragonfly's wing. One drop in the mighty blue ocean. One star in infinity. One soul in a million. One open porthole into my life - my story.

So without further ado, allow me to reintroduce myself.

I'm Anna, a 20-year-old homeschool graduate from a Midwest small town who reads book obsessively, daydreams shamelessly, believes in never growing up, and loathes the unlived life. I have four sisters - there are five altogether and I fall in second. I currently nanny part time with my sister-best friend-partner in crime, Michaela. My greatest wish is to abide in Jesus every day, with all my heart, and shine light on the darkness. 

    

I find true pleasure in people watching, coffee shops, road trips, hugs, fairytales, rodeos, and the ocean to name a few. I'm artsy to the core, thanks to being seventy-five percent Italian, and absorb anything related to singing, dancing, writing and theater. Film making and acting are other interests, and I'm in the midst of learning photography and guitar. I'm a country girl at heart (yeah only at heart, quite sadly,) who wants to raise my own sheep someday. I've never been the awkwardly shy girl holding up the wall but I don't wear my heart on my sleeve either.

There will never be enough time for all the books I want to read, the places I want to go, the people I want to see, or the experiences I dream of having. I am dangerously literary. I have a thing for the melodramatic. I try to find the magic in everything, and happiness tends to make me cry more than the unhappy. I'm short and hobbit-y on many levels. I want to make others think of beautiful things. I loathe mediocrity and unoriginality. Sometimes music is so beautiful it hurts. Someday's I'd just rather be fighting pirates. I'd die without my imagination. 

   

"What, after all, is romance?  It is the music of those who make the world turn, the people who make things happen. Romance is the story of dreams that could come true and so often do. Why do men ride the range? Go to sea? Explore the polar icecaps? Why do they ride rockets to unknown worlds? It is because of romance, because of the stories they have read and the stories they have dreamed. Some have said this is the age of the non hero, that the day of the hero is gone.  That's nonsense. When the hero is gone, man himself will be gone, for the hero is our future, our destiny."  
-Louis L'amour

> > > Last but not least, a special thanks to the whimsical and writerly Bree Holloway for the darling new design!  

Here I begin again. 
Viva la vida.

the good things

People that have left, even if unknown to them, a hand print on your heart in one way or another. Maybe they've forgotten about you. Maybe you haven't even met them yet. But you'll never forget them anyway. 

Stories. The ones that make you cheer and cry and ache and shiver. The stories behind velvet theater curtains, in the hometown cinema, in your playlist cue, in the next batch of books you're ordering from the library. The stories in your head. Pretending to be in every one.

Playing out perfect life scenarios in your head. Pretty sure I'll still be doing this when I'm an old lady.

The turrets of warm, windy, green tress outside. And every single hidden doorway into Wonderland you can find among them. 

    

Dancing alone. With no partner. Just you and the rhythm, letting the music move you and take you around the room.

Now has anyone seen my shadow...

p.s. STORIA is coming soon! for real. :) just celebrating with a small teaser-post. cheers!