Last night we had three snowflakes on the windshield. At least, I’m pretty sure they were snowflakes. Anyhow, they quickly turned into rain and the hope of snow was gone. I thought it would be pretty awesome to have snow while LD was here.
The wind was wicked as hell for a while. It was bitter cold. Snow seemed imminent.
We were on our way to see Blue Man Group with a quick stop at a house so Buster could check out some drums. A conga and a tumba. Sort of a tobacco burst color (not unlike what’s here on wikipedia, though his are a bit lighter) with gold hardware. Beautiful instruments. Yes, he ended up getting them. People are either selling off instruments so they can afford to buy presents for the family or they’re buying them to give as gifts. Buster, ever the semi-evil genius, has done very well this season.
One of the greatest things about living here is the fact that music is all around me. It’s always just a click of a button away. Or I’m a step away from some sort of instrument. Everything from bagpipes to didgeridoos to, well, even a gong. From the exotic to the most common, recognizable of instruments. The only thing that could make it better is kids. Right now, I have one here. Sigh.
It was weird, but Buster said something last night that I’d been thinking all day long: true happiness always seems to follow on the heels of serenity. (It helps that we have coffee mugs that say “happiness” and “serenity”.) Think about it. You can have fleeting happiness. The sort that drifts in and out of your life and seems so random. Or, you can develop a sense of serenity from which a deeper happiness springs. I’ve been working toward the latter and it really hit home yesterday that this was something that was happening to me. It’s not that I don’t still have rough days. I do. But I’m developing an inner peace I haven’t felt in a very long time. It feels almost foreign when it first sets upon you. Then you discover it’s working its way in, like a good lotion on dry skin. The soul itches less each day. It builds slowly. Warming you from the inside out.
Before you know it, you’re actually kind of joyous when you previously wouldn’t have been. Yes, things can be far from perfect, but you get to a point where you’re not experiencing such extremes in terms of mood or general well-being.
Finding that place in life shouldn’t be so hard, but it often is for us. We humans are complicated beings, aren’t we?
Here, in this home, with a good friend, a funny cat, music, and now my son (for the few days I have him), there is peace in my life. It’s been building. It’ll keep building because I’ve felt it and I crave it. If I can maintain that serenity, I’ll have a solid foundation from which I can build the rest of my life. My business, my family, all of it will come from a place of calm, quiet strength.
It’s a new world and new attitude for this gal.
Even the lack of snowflakes couldn’t put a damper what I’ve been feeling.