Take a minute, say the phrase, ask yourself what comes to mind.
A warm blanket? A warm puppy?
A warm gun.
That first hint of springtime green which really is gold.
A deep ruby Grenache that catches the light and warms the spirit.
A walk around the lake, alone, or through a museum, with a friend.
A very dry martini, straight up, with a twist.
A new dishwasher with a half-load cycle (let’s hear it for energy-efficiency!)
Watching dolphins blowing bubble rings underwater in a PBS/Nova series, Inside Animal Minds. Evolution takes on a new light when you see the real connection between socialization and survival of a species. Communication runs deeper than thought.
Dancing with abandon.
Plunging into a book that begins with these words, “It was the happiest moment of my life,” and ends with these: “’Let everyone know, I lived a very happy life.’” Between those bookend phrases are 530 pages riddled with irony, and sadness, obsessive love and the longing it gives rise to.
Is happiness contingent on love?
Try to find someone
Keep on walking strong
With your heart open wide
You’ll be satisfied . . .
—The Subdudes
Is a simpler life really the answer?
Down in the jungle living in a tent
You don’t use money you don’t pay rent
You don’t even know the time but you don’t mind . .
—Paul McCartney
In the spectrum of things that embody happiness, music is as close to the top of the list as it gets. It’s a body thing, out of thought. Even sad music, for the pure pleasure of listening and every nuanced emotion it encompasses, hails with happiness.
I’m only home away from home
I’m only all there when I’m gone
I only miss you when I’m with you
I’m only happy when I’m singing a sad sad song
—Rhett Miller
Making playlists is an unabashed joy. There’s an art to the segue, song to song. When I’m at the gym, on the Elliptical machine, a playlist that includes Johnny Ray Allen (You’ll Be) Satisfied and Paul McCartney, Mrs. Vandebilt, Craig Finn, Honolulu Blues and Rhett Miller, Out of Love, is very very good for the heart. Picturing David Bowie and Mick Jagger in their classic Dancing in the Street video is good for the soul. Not that the Laura Nyro/LaBelle cover, or the original Martha Reeves and the Vandellas doesn’t have pride of place in my ‘Dance’ playlist, along with Lady Gaga (duh) and the Scissor Sisters. And Billy Idol. I’m big on dancing with myself.
Satisfaction? I can’t say I don’t get no. Depends on the day. One good paragraph, a line that sings, caveat (‘Kill your darlings’) aside.
A row of turtles resting on a log in the lake always stops me.
Looking up at cumulus clouds floating against a backdrop of at least five shades of blue.
The eerie trill of toads, a mating call as intoxicating as it gets.
A blue jay’s whistle.
A reflexology foot massage.
I could go on and on, and we all have lists of our own making. . . but isn’t there something a little less tangible at the heart of true happiness? Isn’t looking from the outside/in worlds apart from going from the inside/out? Pema Chodron says we’ll never find happiness as long as we keep looking for it all the wrong places, a habit that’s hard to break. Matthieu Ricard, who has been dubbed the happiest man on earth (a label he disclaims), makes a distinction between things that give us pleasure and an inner sense of flourishing, fulfillment.
In the truest of all possible worlds, happiness is that thing that knows we’re part of a greater whole, interconnected. It comes from a place deep inside, where mind stops chattering, serenity takes hold, compassion is a given. In the day-to-day world as we (mostly) live it, it’s something outside of us—riddled with longing, hope, waiting for something that might make us feel better. Today.
Tomorrow I fly to California, a long way to go for a mini-roadtrip with my daughter in her spiffy new car. It will be the first time in a few years that we’ll be spending Mother’s Day together. On the grand scale of things that make me happy, doesn’t get much better than that.
