Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Boring Post About Being Happy

Apparently accounts of happiness are rather tedious, whereas tales of misery are tremendously interesting. This makes sense. If happiness were interesting there would be no country music, no soap operas, no Game of Thrones, no murder mysteries, no Celeb Culture. Imagine a world where Kerry Katona had a trouble-free birth or Katie Price had a happy marriage. How horrific would it be that a soap opera wedding should pass without incident, or a Game of Thrones wedding pass without mass carnage and regicide? Unhappiness and misery are very newsworthy.

This is why today's post will be boring.

I started my day with an early morning dream.

Other people's dreams are so very tedious, are they not? But this is my blog and I'll be boring if I want to.

My dream was tremendously entertaining and quite surreal - as dreams often are. My younger brother and I were driving slowly down the length of the road we lived on for most of my young life. And where he still lives. It was the gloaming. Things had changed. There were new houses on the road and  many of them had the same interesting flower growing in the gardens. It was tree height, but not a tree. It was a sky-blue campanula, gigantic, with flowers bigger than a human head. And there were birds roosting in plum trees at the side of the road. At first I thought they were magpies but then saw they were jays, hundreds of them. Just as campanulas do not grow higher than houses, neither do jays flock in hundreds. We decided to visit our neighbour. She was just as she always was, always has been for more than fifty years. And this too was surreal for, in real life, our neighbour is not as she was.

I was wakened by someone calling - Mary. For this is my real name, not Nelly. I pretend to Nelly. It was part of the dream and it called me to wakefulness.

An enjoyable dream can just set up the day. There was good weather. I did necessary chores then I spent the rest of the day gardening. Nothing makes me happier. I did not have to go out, visitors were scarce. At six I started dinner, at seven we ate it, at eight I poured us a gin, at nine I had a bath. Happy all day. What an achievement. What a delight.

7 comments:

Mage said...

I would have snuck in an hour with a book, and an hour after the dishes with an old favorite TV show. I like boring entries. :)

Nelly said...

That would have been good too. On days like that, I wish there were more hours.

Brig said...

What is boring about living a happy life... it's what makes the tough parts worth it! I love time in the garden, I can let my mind go where it will, and to read, and have a cigar and a scotch in twilight... sublime...

Cuidado said...

I am happy
that you are happy
for I am happy too.

A happy day
in every way
does chase away the blues

Nelly said...

One of the pleasures of getting older is that I thoroughly, totally appreciate the happy times.

Nelly said...

And, nearly forgot, it makes me happy that y'all can appreciate happiness too.

Leitrim Sister said...

Keep up the good work Sis