When I was little, I used to wish I could bottle up perfect moments in my life, so that I could take them out later and relive them. Back then, I pictured a row of glass bottles, similar to the kind you throw in the water with a message inside, capturing the best times of my life. These days, we have much more sophisticated technologies — all sorts of cameras, videos, even holograms — but they still wouldn’t fulfill my childhood wish.

I didn’t want a representation of the moment, after all. I wanted the moment itself, complete with feelings and thoughts and physical sensations.

This was the first reason I started writing. I would scribble for hours in my spiral notebooks, attempting to record (and therefore keep for always) every moment of my middle school experience. Not that said time was particularly happy, much less perfect. But everything at that age was so new and precious and emotional, I couldn’t bear the thought of letting any moment slip away and disappear forever.

The moments I want to keep now are fewer and far between. But that doesn’t make them any less precious.

I experienced one just the other day.

The sky was that calm, pure blue, where the few clouds unfurled like lingering wisps of cotton. Plump raspberries peeked out behind leaves, hidden gems just waiting to be discovered. And my children ran up and down the rows of bushes, white buckets clattering around their knees, yelling, “Mama! Come quick! I found the biggest, juiciest berry ever!”

My heart felt content. Peaceful. Everything was right in my world.

So right, in fact, that I didn’t think to take any photographs of that moment in the raspberry fields. But that’s okay. I’ve never needed a pictorial representation in order to remember.

What perfect moments have you experienced recently? Please share! I’d love to hear all about them!