Glee

 

“We all enter this world crying. Laughter is something we have to learn.” ~ Gina Barreca

My 9-year-old niece was this past weekend consumed with glee over some news I had delivered. It was about a shiny new toy that was on its way but had not arrived and would not arrive for a few days at least. The delay was no impediment to her overwhelming joy and she completely went crazy asking 101 questions, memorizing details, educating her grandmother about the item, and making plans for when it arrived.

It got me thinking.

When was the last time I was that excited about anything?

Are there things in my life worth getting so raving mirthful about?

It’s a new day. I’m alive. I’m well and whole. It is raining – rain, not bombs. The grudging love of my 2 cats. I own hiking boots. I have friends. God loves me and calls me His friend.

That is not a list of perishable toys. Those are priceless gifts that but for the grace of God, I cannot manufacture or purchase. Without those gifts, especially the gift of life, I AM NOT.

So why is it that while I AM I am not overjoyed when I open my eyes in the morning and realize I am here for one more day? Why is my life not a big, never-ending festivity of jovial, mirthful, merriment?

Perspective is one reason it is not those things. Most days I cannot see the forest for the trees. Most days I walk around with wooden glasses that have my hardships, delays, and limitations inscribed on the inside and the miracles around me obscured. And indeed there are many reminders all around me of why it is a gloomy existence. But I have the power to choose what I will focus on.

If I am passing a petrol station, I can either focus on the pump price board, or focus on the fact that I have somewhere to go, I can afford the fuel, and I’m in a car, not on top of a donkey’s back. Yes, fuel prices are currently a thorn in the flesh for many but this too shall pass.

Find something to be awfully jovial about every so often. Laughter is good medicine and it causes us to well up with gratitude. May your wrinkles today be laugh lines, not frown furrows.

“Mirth is God’s medicine. Everybody ought to bathe in it.” ~ Henry Ward Beecher

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On Pain

Image
  On Pain Kahlil Gibran, 1883 – 1931 And a woman spoke, saying, Tell us of Pain. And he said: Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain. And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy; And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields. And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief. Much of your pain is self-chosen. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self. Therefore, trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquility:   For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,   And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay whic...
Read more

Out for Service

Hi readers. Unfortunately the musings are at still at the garage and return date is still out in the clouds. I found a great quote that put this pause into perspective for me. As you hold out patiently, I'd love for you think about the things that look like unnecessary curve balls in your life today. Are they really?  Enjoy the archives, luckily they are rich in content as we wait for a return.  " The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one's 'own' or 'real' life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one's real life - the life God is sending one day by day. " ~ C.S. Lewis CG
Read more

Horse and Buggy Days

Image
  “ I am old enough to enjoy a bit of nostalgia, but wise enough to know that there haven’t been any “good ol’ days” since Eden (the garden, not the prime minister). ” ~ Ron Brackin During my devotion this week, I found myself reminiscing about the ‘good ol’ days’. One of the verses I’d read had put me in that frame of mind and I rested there a while before reality called me back. The verse was from Habakkuk 3:2, which reads “Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord. Repeat them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy.” (NIV) I had been reading a news article before I read my Bible that day, and it’s easy to see why that verse jumped out at me and sent me into the land of Nostalgia. Things are bad and so much is not working out. Time is moving but not much else is. Problems are mounting and solutions are few. So yes, I remember the days when prayers were answered; when miracles were popping all around me; when it was one...
Read more