Virginia Woolf called them our "secret deposit of exquisite moments" -- all the trivial details that when collected together constitute the sum of who you are.
(Virginia Woolf by Ottoline Morrell, 1926. Via here.)
From Mrs. Dalloway:
The hall of the house was as cool as a vault. The cook whistled in the kitchen. She heard the click of the typewriter. It was her life and, bending her head over the hall table she bowed beneath the influence, felt blessed and purified, saying to herself...how moments like this are buds on the tree of life (as if some lovely rose had blossomed for her eyes only).
What would the atoms of your life include?
A quiet morning?
(All photos by LBG.)
An especially good cup of coffee?
A colorful stack of freshly laundered quilts?
The day the tree bloomed?
A fruitless afternoon of fishing?
The well-worn welcome of a favorite chair?
The otherworldly gleam of a drinks tray as the late afternoon sun hits it?
The silence of the mountains?
If your Monday isn't shaping up to be exactly the way you hoped it would, stop right now and console yourself with this little thought: In the long run, it's not the big things you're going to remember.