HAPPINESS
January
16, 2006
I
woke up happy and for several seconds felt healthy and carefree. In the lives of the saddest of us there are
bright days when we feel we could take the world in our arms. That was my feeling. Then I felt guilt-how could I be happy? I'm not ready. I'm still mourning but the feeling stayed a
while, and I knew my day would be good.
What is happiness? I shared my euphoric feeling with my son
Kevin. He believes happiness is what you
feel when you are very young-before you have a thought process and are able to
put words together. It is a natural feeling
and how you are supposed to feel.
A baby cannot think in sentences and
doesn't know true unhappiness. He
develops that as he ages. Kevin gave as
an example his one-year-old granddaughter, Emma. He and his wife, Ellen, love to take her out
to eat-they know she is the cutest baby in the restaurant. He tells me her huge blue eyes evoke smiles
and doting from all the waitresses (so they tell me). Emma loves to look around at people and tries
to get their attention. She is
especially drawn to other children and stares at them, smiles and makes little
screaming noises until they look at her.
Lately she has learned to look at
them, say hi, raise her little hand and curl her fingers in a wave. She is truly happy. But as she gets older she will learn that she
must face adversity to learn how to be happy.
Happiness has many definitions-joy,
delight, contentment and well-being. Sometimes
we have to look hard to find it. Our
park has a large white gazebo built on top of a small hill amid a field of
grass. The area surrounding the field is
edged with trees donated in memory of departed loved ones. A small bronze plaque noting the deceased's
name is placed in front of each tree. A
beautiful rainbow of flowers circles the gazebo where walking stones form a
random path. As you step inside and
turn, the overwhelming view seems to fly across the city of Sharon into the
horizon beyond. One day, my husband and
I packed some sandwiches and sat in the gazebo in contended silence as we
appreciated the solace of this quiet heaven.
Sometimes things are so beautiful you want to share them with everyone.
Pieces of happiness are all around
us. We only need to open our eyes.
(An aside-if I walked around with a
cell phone I would miss many moments of happiness.)
Joanne
Murray is my cousin. She sent me a book her son made for her 75th
Birthday. It contained essays that Joanne had written. In the
interest of bias, I am definitely biased so let's get that out of the way.
But once you and I get passed my bias you come to realize as I have that these
essays are something very special especially to her family and THAT IS THE
POINT. As I read them the one of many thoughts that crept into my mind
was "why haven't I been doing this?" Why indeed! These
are thoughts of a daughter, a granddaughter, a mother, a wife, a cousin (like
in my case), an aunt etc. Most who will read these essays have that in
common with Joanne. There are people you know who might enjoy knowing
what you think and what experiences you have been exposed to. Wouldn't it
be nice if you let them know by writing them down as my cousin Joanne has
done. It's never too late to get started. I will be posting them
here about one a week and do so with Joanne's permission. Hope you keep
coming back. Leave your comments below. Jim
"Gymbeaux" Brown
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