Happiness is. . .

I love "Happiness is a Warm Puppy", the Peanuts book with cute drawings about what happiness is. Most of the things in the book are very simple, things like "Happiness is walking in the grass with your bare feet." It sounds so trite, but the more I think about it the more I realize how true it is.

I haven't been particularly happy lately. I haven't felt great, and I've been stressed out by all the projects that we've been working on around here. Caradorn hasn't been home as much as I would like and The Kidd was spending a week with my parents, and I felt sort of overwhelmed by all that was going on. Things weren't progressing as fast as I would have liked and I was getting discouraged - it seemed like a constant case of "1 step forward, 2 steps back."

We made a huge amount of progress over the weekend, though, and suddenly things are looking much better. I think there might be hope that we will eventually finish all of our projects. Some root beer and some sleep last night seem to have cured my zombie problem from yesterday, and this afternoon I finally have time to sit down and relax.

I'm sitting at a bistro table next to a window with the laptop and a cup of tea, and I just realized that I am actually feeling quite happy. I have some 1940s music playing, there's a cat curled up in a sunbeam next to me and a dog sleeping by my chair. Outside it almost looks like fall and the flowers are blowing in the breeze. There's what looks like a young wren singing and splashing in the birdbath and a family of cardinals at the bird feeder, and three hummingbirds keep visiting their feeder right next to the window. The Kidd is upstairs playing one of the computer games he got for his birthday and he occasionally comes down to ask me to come see something new he has built on there. On the coffee table is a big stack of books that are waiting for me to read them, and according to Caradorn's last text he might even be home at a decent time today.

There isn't anything hugely exciting going on, but it's still almost a perfect afternoon. I'm always so busy trying to get things done or looking forward to the big things like trips or concerts or shows that I sometimes forget to stop and appreciate the simple things. I need to remember this more often. Sometimes happiness is as simple as a quiet afternoon and a cup of tea.