About the Author

 Growing up, Kelli Volonte has realized sometimes you have to be the princess and knight in shinning armor. It has always been important to her that young girls find peace with themselves and learn to love who you are; all the while knowing that being happy fulfills them as people. Instead of thinking falling in love with another person will make them whole.

This is her first published book. She lives in Springfield, Missouri with her mother, brother, dog, and four cats.

Movie Preferences

  Oceans Eleven is an underrated classic. It's kinda like Leo’s Inception, where it takes a few times and a crap ton of attention to understand it, but once you do, the brilliance of it hits like an ocean wave, slowly dragging you into the amazement of it.
   80’s movies are my downfall. 90’s are a close second. But my undying love for The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Take up approximately 80.1232% of my heart, while the rest is reserved for food. You’ve Got Mail, Pretty Woman, and When Harry Met Sally are what I grew up watching, and are now what I base my love life off of; which is probably why I'm still writing the manuscript for my wedding.
   I've never understood why people like horror movies. They're full of negativity and horrible things; why would you want that in your life? The world is hard enough to stay positive in without being reminded of the scary vastness of how much we don't know or can't control.
   Movies and tv shows are my life. They're the best way for me to escape from reality, take a break from things. They also inspire me. I use them as a motivational tool. I'm usually in bed or on my couch in my front room. Before I got a job my mom and I would go see a movie in theatres every other week. It was great bonding time and a nice way to get out of the house. We've only been to the movies once since Campbell 16 closed. I really miss those nights, especially the popcorn. Movie theatre popcorn tastes so much better than regular popcorn.
   Building a fort and filling it like the inside of a pie with soft pillows and fuzzy blankets to settle in for a movie marathon of all of my favorite old time romance classics on a rainy day with candles burning next to a cracked window in an empty, quiet house is still on my to do list, but I like to think I'm close to checking it off.
   If I were to answer that last question honestly it would be sad and depressing and far too emotional than I would like to share, so instead I'm going to write about a day I hope to experience.
   Rain welcomes the hello from a long lost love of a window as the city outside begins to stretch and wake up. The slight breeze waltz in with smell of rain on its jacket as the perfume entices the scent of fresh laundry wandering around the apartment. They greet Frank Sinatra as he speaks a language of love threaded together by music notes of a saxophone.







 

Dan in Real Life

   My brother turns thirteen in December. He's in seventh grade. In my opinion, seventh grade is the hardest year of an already hard age. You're in the middle of everything, lost in a sea of expectations and newfound pressures that come with getting older, especially when it comes to socializing in school. Grades are different and teachers have less empathy. This quick sand is hard for a marathon athlete of life’s hardships at thirteen. Therefore I try to be for him what I needed someone to be for me at his age. These are my guidelines:


you have to let them make their own choices; the best you can do is educate them as much as possible and hope they make the right decision
you can't protect them from everything; letting them make their own mistakes is how they learn
support them no matter what


They're a lot easier to preach than to practice but we’re all doing the best we can do.


   After looking at the most iconic photos of this millennium, I realized what fuels my fire is taking those in a moment fleeting photos that capture something so beautifully astounding and breathless which tells a story far beyond what words could ever do. I want to go to Iraq and India and Ethiopia and so many other places that will strip me of all but the bare necessities to gain perspective and lose the materialistic edge that I'm in a battle with everyday. I want to help those that have suffered far more than I ever will, and those who bear stories most people in this country will never understand. All the while, I want to share that with the world; to inspire those who sit in the back of an economics class listening to over privileged teenagers try to talk about something they know nothing about and feel like the world is against them because only they know the truth; it will be a reminder that the world holds so much more than a life of trying to make millions and losing everything you thought you stood for along the way. Love and selflessness is what holds the world together.


   I like to think that if tubing and hide and seek were Olympic sports, I'd be a gold medalist. While I won't spill any of my secrets for either, hide and seek was a special favorite pastime of mine to play as a kid and still is. My favorite spot in my house to hide was the very back of my mom’s closet, behind all of her long black clothing reserved for certain occasions, upon the plastic tubs in which the contents are still unknown to this day. Sometimes when I was feeling the need to be alone in a quiet, safe space I would climb to the back of the closet in the hallway across from the bathroom. Behind all of my mom’s fancy dresses and past the spare toilet paper, to lay on the comforters and blankets. Sometimes I wish I could go back to that.










 

Movie Quotes

I'm such a sucker for quotes, especially quotes from my favorite movies.

They were too good not to post.

"It only took three months. Twelve years and three months."

Captions Aren't My Thing

I noticed today that a few planets were missing. I wonder how long they've been gone and where they disappeared to.

"Do not look at yourself with disgust, you are a gift to this earth. You are beautiful, you are a light, an energy, an essence. You are nature herself."

- Heidi Pickett

This is Iman. I named him after the world's first black supermodel because she represents courage and bravery and a type of diversity that not everyone can understand; she was stunningly beautiful in an unconventional way, and I believe that he (my cat) is just as breathtaking, but many people thought he was ugly.

"I don't know what it was, you see. Her eyes had a certain sparkle. Her personality was fiery and precious."

I've always wanted to do a piece that breaks out of society's mold, therefore I made a deal with my brother and his friends. If they would come take photos with me, I would drive them around to skate spots. This piece would be titled, "Boys Can Wear Highlighter Too".

I found him in a house off Commercial street on the edge of town. The house was filled with fleas, bedbugs, cockroaches. He was locked in the bathroom with three other kittens. There was no litter box, cat food bowl, water bowl. The guy who "owned" him decided to spend his very little money on drugs, alcohol, and shitty pizza. He would feed these kittens, who were barely old enough to walk, scraps of food once a day. The day I was there, he fed them torn up pieces pizza crust. They fought over the scraps in such a desperate, heart shattering way that it made you see things from a different perspective. 

They called him "The Asshole" because he smaller and was more aggressive. He would sprint from one side of the couch to the next trying to get a bite of food. I would watch him and his siblings play with dead cockroaches in the kitchen after they're bellies were too bloated from high processed carbs to eat anything else. I was the only one who tried to show him any love.

After I took him and two of the other kittens, we found them good homes where they would be safe and loved. He's now my best friend. He purrs the loudest of any of my cats; he'll follow me from room to room. The compassion he exerts is astounding. If my cat can understand empathy and compassion, how can humans beings not?

There's a special kind of grace and purity in capturing moments of unexpected bliss. 

It took me a long time to understand why people cared if they could walk around shirtless in public or not. Eventually I realized that was not the point they were trying to make. 

It still hasn't sunk in that half of my high school career is already over.

"You get a strange feeling when you're about to leave a place. Like you'll not only miss the people you love but you'll miss the person you are now at this time and this place, because you'll never be this way ever again."

- Azar Nafisi

The lighting and trees looked too good not to capture.

Rainy days are a blessing.

It was surreal to be able to hold all of our hardwork in my hands. Weeks and hours and deadlines all for this. Seeing my name printed with words I wrote and photos I took, to be distributed throughout the school and shown off as a representation of Kickapoo, was a feeling like no other. 

"I know these will all be stories someday, and our pictures will become old photographs. We'll all become someone's mom or dad. But right now, these moments are not stories. This is happening."

- Perks of Being a Wallflower

Edward Hopper Inspired Writing

The light cold breeze
wraps you in a bear hug
through your coat and scarf.
The man tinkers with the gas
pump and you wonder
how he could not be freezing.
The crickets sing love songs
of lonely heart in the night.


Your suitcase sits at your feet
as you raise a cigarette to your lightly chapped lips,
whispering the cries for love that is lost.
Contempt in your solitude,
you blow a cloud of smoke
into the chilly night air
and the time passes
like there is no tomorrow.


White wine embraces the lover's
lips like a New Year's kiss.
Cigarette smoke preforms
intimacies with the fresh air
that fills their lungs,
yet leaves them just as
breathless as a passionate
tongue dance.

Window Poem

Through My Kitchen Window


Snow coats the
once green grace.
Foot prints decorate the lawn,
like a handcrafted cake.
Bird feed has fallen onto the
ground underneath and
the bird bath is now
an ice skating rink
for all those walking feathers
inclined to do so.
Steam rises up
and lightly kisses the glass.
Soap and warm water
are always the best combination
to relax on a winter day.