Perhaps my age has something to do with how often I've been reflecting on my childhood lately. Or, maybe my sentimentalism is more profound due to me thinking about my mother who passed away 3 years ago yesterday.
Could be I'm looking back because I'm taking another leap of faith and my foothold is more firm in my past than it is in the here and now.
Whatever the reason, I felt compelled to walk back in time...to walk barefoot in the grass today. My feet have been socked and covered all winter and they needed to breathe. Just that simple walk through the yard--feeling the tender wet grass between my winter-pruned toes as the sun warmed my back--made me feel seven years old again.
When I was seven, the world seemed simpler, though I knew a war was going on (how could I not know--Walter Cronkite on Channel 8 was our constant dinner companion.). I was terribly shy with adults and strangers but enjoyed playing "Hide and Seek" and "Mother May I" with my neighborhood friends and cousins. Both my maternal and paternal grandparents were still alive and even paternal great-grandparents for a short while. Christmas and Easter were still 'magical' and playing on the swing set in my backyard was like having a castle with a mote. I looked forward to hearing the bells chime on the Snow Cone Lady's white El Camino as she drove past our house. My favorite flavor was blueberry and sometimes I paid for it with my own dime.
Yes, summertime is sweet and simple when you're seven years old.
I remember running outside to play the minute my cereal was gone, hoping to find my best friend, Susan and her dog, Lady. If she was not outside, I would sometimes sit on the front porch, play with my Barbie, using the metal Thompson milk box as a doll house. I loved sitting on our front porch before the afternoon sun made it hot. The porch's cold cement felt...comforting...safe. Well, maybe not safe for the ants or 'Rollie-pollie' bugs I squished, but it felt safe to me.
And that's how the grass under my feet made me feel today...comforted and safe.
As adults, we're our own worst enemy. We take ourselves WAY too seriously. We run outside the minute our cereal's gone, but not to play and enjoy the day. With children to support, clients to please, and family to appease and a house to keep clean, we forget to breathe! Coffee in one hand in the morning, maybe lunch in the other later on--if we have time--and a rushed evening if there are meetings, practices, concerts or games describes most working parents' daily lives. Though we gladly accept our roles and desire a fun and full life for our family, parents often lose their own identity.
When your world is rushed, uncertain, scary, full of complication and confusion, my advice is simply take off your adult shoes. Find time to capture joy before it escapes the day. Make time to unwind before time winds you up. The more you pursue the simpler things in life, the more you will realize that life is really pretty simple.
Pure inner happiness--not contentment in life--doesn't cost a dime (though that blueberry snow cone made me happy). But a life without that kind of happiness is costly.
Simple work. Simple play. Simple happiness. Simple love. "If only it were that easy!" we tell ourselves. Life is complicated. Love is not easy. Our occupation may have chose us instead of us choosing it. Seldom are we completely satisfied with who and where we are. But I believe true happiness is attainable. With child-like faith, child-like joy and a child-like attitude towards life, our idle perspectives and monotonous living will no longer define or confine us.
True, simple happiness is not found in what we are pursuing, but in the actual pursuit itself--our journey--our child-like barefoot walk in the grass.
Could be I'm looking back because I'm taking another leap of faith and my foothold is more firm in my past than it is in the here and now.
Whatever the reason, I felt compelled to walk back in time...to walk barefoot in the grass today. My feet have been socked and covered all winter and they needed to breathe. Just that simple walk through the yard--feeling the tender wet grass between my winter-pruned toes as the sun warmed my back--made me feel seven years old again.
When I was seven, the world seemed simpler, though I knew a war was going on (how could I not know--Walter Cronkite on Channel 8 was our constant dinner companion.). I was terribly shy with adults and strangers but enjoyed playing "Hide and Seek" and "Mother May I" with my neighborhood friends and cousins. Both my maternal and paternal grandparents were still alive and even paternal great-grandparents for a short while. Christmas and Easter were still 'magical' and playing on the swing set in my backyard was like having a castle with a mote. I looked forward to hearing the bells chime on the Snow Cone Lady's white El Camino as she drove past our house. My favorite flavor was blueberry and sometimes I paid for it with my own dime.
Yes, summertime is sweet and simple when you're seven years old.
I remember running outside to play the minute my cereal was gone, hoping to find my best friend, Susan and her dog, Lady. If she was not outside, I would sometimes sit on the front porch, play with my Barbie, using the metal Thompson milk box as a doll house. I loved sitting on our front porch before the afternoon sun made it hot. The porch's cold cement felt...comforting...safe. Well, maybe not safe for the ants or 'Rollie-pollie' bugs I squished, but it felt safe to me.
And that's how the grass under my feet made me feel today...comforted and safe.
As adults, we're our own worst enemy. We take ourselves WAY too seriously. We run outside the minute our cereal's gone, but not to play and enjoy the day. With children to support, clients to please, and family to appease and a house to keep clean, we forget to breathe! Coffee in one hand in the morning, maybe lunch in the other later on--if we have time--and a rushed evening if there are meetings, practices, concerts or games describes most working parents' daily lives. Though we gladly accept our roles and desire a fun and full life for our family, parents often lose their own identity.
When your world is rushed, uncertain, scary, full of complication and confusion, my advice is simply take off your adult shoes. Find time to capture joy before it escapes the day. Make time to unwind before time winds you up. The more you pursue the simpler things in life, the more you will realize that life is really pretty simple.
Pure inner happiness--not contentment in life--doesn't cost a dime (though that blueberry snow cone made me happy). But a life without that kind of happiness is costly.
Simple work. Simple play. Simple happiness. Simple love. "If only it were that easy!" we tell ourselves. Life is complicated. Love is not easy. Our occupation may have chose us instead of us choosing it. Seldom are we completely satisfied with who and where we are. But I believe true happiness is attainable. With child-like faith, child-like joy and a child-like attitude towards life, our idle perspectives and monotonous living will no longer define or confine us.
True, simple happiness is not found in what we are pursuing, but in the actual pursuit itself--our journey--our child-like barefoot walk in the grass.
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