Sweet Moments

 

 

"They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: someone to love, something to do and something to hope for," Tom Bodett

Life will never be the same since covid.  We can say “getting back to normal” but that can not be.  We are cell-deeply changed.  I do not mean that we are happy happy happy that it is almost controlled and we survived.  I mean that we have learned some important lessons that all is not pure pleasure and pure peace and pure anything.  It is not all about joy joy joy, either.  It is about having found some sweet moments during a difficult time of uncertainty.  That we learned “uncertainty” is huge and we won’t just suddenly get over that.  We learned “fear” and its many components.  We may have even learned some of our “shadows” that were lying in wait waiting for a time and place to wriggle out.  But, “back to normal”?  Not ever again.  Yes, it will be a new normal, but let’s not forget some things we have learned.  Wisdom has changed.  We should have learned to identify sweet moments through this all.

My daughter taught me how to make a homemade charcuterie board.  It was not a favorite of The Bee Man, but I loved it.  It beat the Safeway little plastic bin with honey pepperoni and two different kinds of cheese blocks that sweated their way through a hot day.  I thought that was expensive so I bought 80 dollars worth of different meats and cheeses from Butcher Boys and made my own which The Bee Man did not like, but it made my heart happy.  Oh, and stress-baking.  I need not say any more.

I learned guilt-free napping.  Oh, the joy the joy for those moments that did not have to be stolen and not talked about.  And, speaking of guilt-free; I could clean the house, or not.  No one was coming over so who cared.  Well, I did and I tended to be really gungho during the first of the isolation, but then that kind of wore off and I did the bear minimum.  A newly mopped floor gave me moments of joy.  Actually sleeping in.  My body still thought it had to beat the clock and I learned I can stay up all night if I choose and there were some sweet moments of creativity in the middle of everyone else’s night.

I learned to watch Bonanza’s 139 episodes and enjoy it.  Well, actually, I napped through most of it, but it kept The Bee Man from wandering around saying, “Let’s take a drive…”  I lost interest in drives so I bore the episodic adventures of his interest.  Amidst it all, there were moments of joy after The Bee Man went to bed and I could binge watch some female comedienne, every royalty documentary, and picked up on card making as I journeyed through YouTube.

The other day we had an almost blue sky day… oh, the joy, the joy.. the first in months where the smoky haze lifted enough to breathe long enough to enjoy.  Oh sweet sweet moments.

I learned to Zoom.  This led to sweet moments of watching creative people create in the live.  And, I got to Zoom with grandkids.  Yes, yes, sweet moments.

I got to try out some of my bathing potions and lotions and I had not remembering how sweet it is to have a real tub bath more often. 

I saved my Trumpet Plant all winter, took it out come spring to beat its roots half off, as you are supposed to, and watch that there were three little leaves beginning.  Oh, the joy of that sweet moment. 

My granddaughter had taught me how to make a play list with Spotify and picking up names of tunes with Shazzam.  I have many many playlists that have new music and they give me sweet moments of joy.

Learning how to order from Amazon and opening up little packets of joy that miraculously show up in the mail or at our door.

Finding sweet moments is what helps us survive, overcome and thrive.  Uncomplicated sweet moments that children have, those are the moments to seek.  In fact, some my sweetest moments were when I was being silly.  Sometimes the smell of homemade bread gives my such sweet memories of grandma and mother and dad and their homemade bread.  Sometimes, a freshly washed and dried fuzzy blanket on the couch give me sweet moments.  I found that it does not take much.  I wouldn’t want to have missed them for the world. The real dope is dopamine and I want lots of it. 

 

©Carol Desjarlais 8.6.21

https://vocal.media/motivation/100-things-that-bring-you-joy