the title.

V. Buda’s parents, Salvatore and Glenyse, would leave love letters to each other on the dining room table every morning back when Buda was barely tall enough to reach the kitchen sink. Back when she and her four sisters were growing up in the big, yellow house on Washington Ave. Back when Buda’s only dream was to one day find a guy as great as her dad.

In the daily letters, Glen and Sal would wish each other wonder for the day.

Sometimes the notes would include a weather report, Cold! Brrr!

Often they’d carry a grocery list, Elbows, Powdered Sugar, TP!

And once in a while they hold an apology, Screwed up. So sorry.

My parents would write their love notes on the backs of envelopes from unpaid bills, on paper towels or on unused submarine sandwich bags with a black marker (Glen and Sal were local restaurant owners of a popular lunch spot called B’s Subs and Stuff). There were plenty of sub bags hanging around the house! remembers the author.

No matter the size or material written on, Glen and Sal’s love notes would open and close the same way:

To Only You, Love Only Me.

There was something so special that I recognized even as a little girl- that you could leave someone feeling beautiful and full with a little consistency, a bit of daily attention and a bunch of scrap paper, said the author.

At the beginning of the pandemic, V. Buda found herself spinning in worry and characteristically turned worry into art. Like I always do, she said.

During a “pay what you can” writing class with Kristin Hanggi, she began putting together bits of her old diaries turning into the new diary.

She then asked her mother for permission to use her parents’ sacred phrase for the title- To Only You, Love Only Me.

Even though her father has been gone for over a decade (he died with Alzheimer’s), Glenyse was still confident she could speak on Salvatore’s behalf and granted her daughter their blessing.

I had this title tucked inside my heart for decades. I was waiting for the right project to use it on.

I’ve created a book designed to record and repeat all the beauty in life, a project created while I was separated from my mother, a creation that holds quotes from my family. It was a perfect fit.

As for the salmon-crested cockatoo on the front cover of the book, (the author purchased the rights to the image, originally printed in an 1800’s illustration book) the author commented, I thought she was a parrot! I identified her incorrectly.

True for many of us, isn’t it? We’re often labeled something we’re not. I know that’s been true for me.

I originally wanted a parrot to play with the idea that everything beautiful needs repeating, but she’s a cockatoo. From what I’ve read cockatoos don’t talk as much as parrots, but I rather like that happy accident, the author giggles. Because now, since there isn’t a parrot to repeat it for you, you have to write your beautiful things inside your new diary!

I dare anyone to be in V.Buda’s presence and not feel the excitement and beauty of being alive. Even if things feel bleak or your not a writer, give her podcast (link included within the diary) a listen. Her voice somehow makes everything feel better. Soon you’ll be looking at your tea cup and get a surge of love for it.

If we sat around together talking at my kitchen counter, we’d discover we have a lot of the same fears, but the more interesting thing to me is we’d also discover we love so many different things. You would play me a song I’ve never heard of but lights up your soul. I might politely listen once but never again. It won’t do the same thing to me. What is that? That energy fascinates me.

As we carry our warmed croissants to her petite living room (the author a proud hostess), Buda sits on the floor though there are plenty of seats. I’d sit on the floor even if you put the world’s coziest sofa in front of me. I love the perspective it gives me.

All those little things that are so beautiful and unique about you, about me, about us, that’s the juice that nourishes Buda’s work.

The author (and Buda’s friend and former writing coach) Catherine Greer, says in her book The Ten Minute Fix, let people remember you. V.Buda used that as her mantra while creating the book.

I hope new diarists will use this book as a place to do just that. I hope you’ll write down all the things you love so, if I picked up your copy of To Only You, Love Only Me off your desk, I would know exactly what makes your heart sing.

More talking about heart songs please!

Because what you love is beautiful.

And the best.

And worth repeating.

We agree, agree, agree.