happiness

A New Month

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And Just Like That – August Was Over

Sometimes in life it seems like life goes by quickly. At other times of course life drags by slowly. What makes that difference? I am pondering that today.

The easy answer is that I am busy. The real answer is I am happy.

A couple days ago I went to a funeral. The event was not a happy event but I was happy that I was able to attend and support my friends. Because of other commitments I thought I would not be able to attend. In talking to the few old men that I knew there, I found that I was not dealing with a myriad of health issues that crop up when old men talk to each other. It made me smile inside a bit, because I am not dealing with nor had dealt with any of the issues discussed.

Admittedly that sounds a bit like bragging. It is not. I have aches and pains. My body reminds me sometimes about my age and my lack of preparation for various athletic activities but overall I am in pretty good health and I am happy for that fact.

I thanked Him for my good health and His graciously sparing me from the various old man issues I heard about at the funeral service.

When Cheryl died last year I was very sad for some time. I was unsure that I would be truly happy again. I was resigned to being alone for the rest of the time God gave me. I also was wondering what is my purpose. Prior to her death I had locked myself into the premise that I was here to help her. Life purpose is an idea that wanders in and out of my thoughts. I was wrong that my only life purpose was Cheryl. There must be more.

I read and re-read Max Ehrmann’s “Desiderata” poem. I read it like advisement and maybe a prayer. He writes “… strive to be happy.” He does not write – strive to be busy.

I have good friends and I have a wonderful woman in my life. For me it is hard to be unhappy. I have found that even though the most important person in my life has left this earthly existence, it is possible to develop a new and lasting relationship. Strive to be happy. Take a chance. Life is relationships.

All of those relationships mingle and make me happy to be here. I was happy when Cheryl was my focal point. I am happy with Debbie as my new focus. Connection with another and others creates purpose. It reveals the goodness and graciousness of our life force, the soul of our being, the beauty of the world and the breathtakingly joyful participation in it. These are happiness itself.

I am searching for some definitive purpose when life is it. I always knew this but I was caught in the conundrum of determining a specificity. Life is random. Be present for it to happen.

“And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should…. Strive to be happy.”

Carpe Diem.

Wishes and Hope and Doubt

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HOPE IS A WISH

I use “Carpe Diem” as a sign off to posts that I put here. A few nights ago as Debbie and I were talking over the phone about random topics, she pointed out to me that for me the use of that phrase is a wish. I responded that I think of it as a motto and that spiraled my thought process into analyzing what that phrase meant to me and why I use it as a motto.

A motto is a brief sentence phrase or a single word used to express a principle, goal or ideal – a maxim. This is from my big dict (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language) which I got from my mother many years ago. The online Merriam-Webster lists proverb as a synonym in their thesaurus section.

Debbie expressed the thought that I use it in the sense of a hope to remain in the present and to remain present to what life brings me. She is right again. I sometimes say to her teasingly that I hate it when she is right but I forget she studied sociological things in school.

Life or, as I like to think, the universal consciousness has brought Debbie into my life. She is a sounding board for ideas of mine and I am of hers. It is curious to me how similar and dissimilar our lives have been before we met. We attended the same schools. Her kiddos and my kiddos attended the same schools. Those are similarities. She chose psychology and sociological studies. I chose engineering, science and technological studies and later in life, education studies. Those are dissimilarities.

Engineers tend to think, plan, organize and prepare for some future activity – an installation, construction, machine, infrastructure – with things. I am always on the hunt for a manual to fix things (and situations), an extrinsic solution. Sociologists work with people – people as they are now. They help them to find their solutions within themselves.

Staying present is hard for me personally. So, seizing the current moment, especially when Cheryl’s disease was getting worse, finding something to do then at that moment, while she was doing good, became incredibly important. I constantly told myself, find what works today.

In that frame of mind I took myself to that first meet up with Debbie over coffee in a coffee house ran by a church group. I seized that moment, that fear of trying something new in my life, and pushed myself out of the doldrums of grief. You do not know if you are ready until you try it.

It worked. So far it is an ecstatic experience with Debbie; conversations about anything and everything, movies and dinner afterwards, fun little field trips, and just talking and flirting on the phone, she is special to me and at the same time I have a niggling fear of that happiness dissipating.

It is a fact that the last person I felt this way with is gone now. I cannot ignore that aspect. Debbie and I talk about that too.

We have now. My hope is our happiness will last until I am no longer. That idea is selfish. It is a wish, however. So far it is a wish fulfilled. (There is the niggling fear again.)

Carpe Diem.