High on Happiness

Archive for the ‘The Nature of Happiness’ Category

Except in rare moments, we, who count our lifespans in mere decades, tend to forget that our vision is short-sighted and focused narrowly on the inconsequential, quickly fading moments of our days.

Tossed by the tides of our concepts and emotions, we get caught up by the he-said, she-said, and the us and them dramas and lose sight of that which is, beyond our stories.  No wonder we despair.

But we are luckier than we remember.  The dream that we inhabit is larger than our own, and truer.  And now and then it signals us.  It paints the world with a certain slant of light, or stretches a rainbow across our skies.  And something in our souls responds, leaping with joy.

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Morning comes pouring out buckets of light.  It splashes on the snow, turning it to diamonds.

You can see the hoofprints where the deer were dancing in the dawn.  The trees are still laughing at the sight of them.

The light rolls down the hill, and morning keeps it coming.  It slides down the tree trunks and bounces up into the sky.

The air is filled with it and you feel it shimmering into your lungs when you inhale.  It turns to clouds when you breathe out.  And it’s inside you now, riding your blood, slipping inside your very cells.

And you breathe some more.  And morning keeps turning it up, brighter now and brighter.

Pause now.  Take this gift of spaciousness and let it dissolve all your cares.   Carrying them won’t bring their solutions any faster.  And sometimes when you free yourself of them, new possibilities appear.

At any rate, you will be stronger, refreshed, revived by letting them go.  Just for now.  Just for this small interlude of calm, of quiet, of peace, where you can simply breathe and be.

See how winter has etched the day with subtle hues?  That is her clue, her offering, her wisdom.

Pause. Breathe. Be.

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I wake to windows adorned crystalline landscapes, with plumes, forests and flowers gleaming in the morning light.

Each pane is more beautiful than the last.  I am mesmerized.  I don’t even notice the cold.

A clump of frost feathers catches the light of the rising sun, looking like finger-painted palm fronds, etched with innocence and joy.

I want to reach through the dimensions and feel the texture of the leaves, to hear their silvery sound as the birds that hide in them take flight, to watch their light ripple through the sky in shimmering waves.

And if I might, I would ask to bring some back with me, some of these feathery fronds, to set in a vase on my piano.  And I would gaze at them and play their song and children would laugh in innocence and joy.

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She’s a mistress of subtlety, this one, scattering her tiny snowflakes on the grass.  But we who have seen many winters know her signs.  This glittering dust is but a sneak preview of what is to come.

By morning, the world will be transformed.  Oak leaves and grass will be only a dream.

With one tiny crystal at a time, January will create her wonderland.

I look at the tiny changes I make, bit by bit, in my own world and take heart.   So much is possible!

Looking at them, I can’t help but believe that some things were destined to be paired.

Like a couple who have long shared a table and bed, they waltz, their limbs intertwined, through the seasons.

Together, they have witnessed history, watched children rise and neighbors fall.  They’ve weathered the same storms and sung together beneath the same stars.

They  have listened to the same peepers call from the creek in the springtime and watched the same flocks of geese fly over in the fall.

They have shaped one another’s growth; they guide each other’s movements.  Their roots, woven together, go deep.

Sometimes a certain bend of light makes all the difference.  Falling just so, it pierces jaded hearts.  Eyes that were glazed see again; minds that were closed open to the truth.

The angels never stop painting the world with their hope.  Everyone can be saved from isolation.  A whispered word can lead toward home.  A sliver of song can mend a shattered soul.

The petal of a rose, a feather on the wind, a waft of a sweet, remembered fragrance—anything will do.   Hope takes endless forms.

Sometimes,  a certain bend of light makes all the difference.

Tell me what you will about soil and sun and seed.  The way the miraculous forms come into being, unfold and disappear is, ultimately, a mystery.   Who can say, after all, what set it into motion, or why?

For each of our answers, ten thousand questions still remain.

But I know this, as I walk through snow on a cold, mid-January morning, my eyes falling on the delicate skeleton of a summer weed:  All of it connects, and all of it sings, and it is all, forever, lovely.

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The snow comes whispering its secrets.

It tells them to the chilled cheeks and outstretched tongues of children, to the welcoming leaves of the azalea, to the sweeping branches of the pine.

To the animals, the secrets are lullabies and they nestle their young beneath their soft bellies and dream that starlight is tumbling from the sky.

If snow fell only once in your lifetime, you, too, would listen in wonder, holding your breath.

As it is, you must remember what it was to be a child, dazzled and eager and glad.

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Ages and seasons, months and minutes heap together here, merging into a single, living collage.  It speaks the poem of their unity, blending them into one click of the ever-changing now.

Drawn by its beauty, we come with our probing eyes, our labeling minds. “Fern,” we say, and “moss, tree, twig.  Leaf, stone, snow,” speaking poems of our own.

Oh, the luscious layers of truth!  Its histories and mysteries, questions and songs all spread before us in such dancing undulations.

And from any angle—within, without, above, below—it’s all the same:

It is.  We are.

Yes.