Happyness.

Hm. I haven't updated in a long time. Which isn't, you know, weird or anything, because not many people read this, if any at all. But anyways.
Suzy, I completely understand what you mean, in your post named "AM I HAPPY?" Throughout these past couple of years, I have felt that way too. I was dissatisfied in some ways that I was dealing with life; yet in others, I feel so much gratitude to all the blessings that I am and have been given. I understand what you mean about not knowing what that middle-word is.

I mean, if one is not laughing, or crying, what are they feeling? What is the emotion that they are experiencing? How is it that there seems to be no real word for it? But it depends on your definition. Let's not go by dictionary definition for a second-let's go by what we think when we characterize ourselves as happy. What do we feel then?
My definition of happy, means that I am given a chance to fully appreciate life and what it has given me. It doesn't mean that I must necessarily be laughing or smiling, or outwardly showing any happiness of any kind. My definition of happy could be walking downtown, staring into tiny shops; it could be walking down an aisle looking for my favourite cereal. It could be drawing or sketching a useless, badly-done piece of art; it could be staring into the sky, simply thinking. Alone with my thoughts. Surrounded by what my life is to me. It could be writing, right now, thinking about what happiness means to me. Since that is what my definition is, that's why I choose to make a list of things that make me happy, in my head, every day.
So. I shall follow through with that. Just little things. Anything.

1. I was asked to be my boss's "personal assistant" today. While that required physically running (literally. Like, I was sweating in a completely COLD, air-conditioned office), I really enjoyed it. It gave me a chance to see what he does and what kind of things he deals with while he's about his work.
2. I talked on the phone about everything my best friend and I did and did not do, and I read my old journals and notebooks out loud to her. (:
   
3. My parents listened to my choice in restaurant, which rarely happens.
   
4. We had a delightful dinner. I ate this type of chicken cooked a certain way that I usually don't eat at other restaurants, and it was the first time I thought it tasted good.
   
5. I updated my "journal" about everything I thought about.
6. I'm writing this blog right now.
7. My brother and I skipped down the parking lot like little kids.
   
8. I sang campfire songs with my parents on the way home from dinner.
9. I worked on a couple of presents I'm intending on giving my best friends.
   
10. I laughed hysterically (no, seriously. HYSTERICALLY, I SAY.) with my brother about this stupid joke I made about the song "My Heart Will Go On" and the words "are gone" and the element of the periodic table "Argon".

In my opinion, no, it doesn't have to be an indication of joy. I don't need to be laughing or specially with friends for happiness to happen to me. It's just whatever makes me happy to be alive, or whatever I find is wonderful and sets the day apart from any other.
I don't know. I didn't much help, I know that. Hehe.
But yep.

A little detour!

Instead of updating everyone who reads this little train trip into my mind on the psychology of language, which I will be coming back to, in my next few posts, I will talk today, about what I learned from my road trips up north as a kid.

I used to go on road trips up north a lot, and every single time we'd pass a visitor's site, we'd pile out of the car to get a glimpse of the view. Sometimes, we'd see these, and I'd always press my parents to give me a couple dollars to pop into the viewing machine to see what truly lurked in the forests, or along the horizon. They always shook their heads and said that it wasn't even worth it, that it would be better just to really see for myself why it was so special. One time, they gave me the amount of money needed to look into these, and I ran away to push the dollars into the machine. But once I looked through, it was somewhat of a disappointment. Sure, it let me get a close-up view, but I couldn't see everything. I could only see out-of-focus details, not what made up the beauty that was in front of me. So yes, seeing the big picture, seeing how everything melted fantastically in front of me, was worth so much more than just seeing the little things, than just magnifying the tiny details and getting them out of focus anyway.
What I mean to say by this, is, that sometimes we should just look up, get out from under these machines, and just look at a situation, or just look at our world around us, for ourselves. For the sake of our happiness, for the sake of stopping and smelling the roses. To just straighten up and view something for what it is, and to stop poring over the slightest detail, when perhaps it is nothing but trivial. To fully appreciate what we have, and to look at the full picture before immediately judging others or ourselves, or instantaneously feeling the need to prove and solve a problem ourselves. Maybe we just need a tiny step back... Maybe we need to stop and smell these roses.

Nostalgia

At times, when I get a whiff of something, hear something familiar, taste something I remember from a certain experience, I get pulled back to the past.
Let me tell you an example.
I was just settling into bed one day, when across the hall, my mom entered the washroom. She flicked on the light/ceiling fan first, though, and I watched the light spill across the hallway.
That, for some strange reason, made me think of my hometown.
Now, this is public, and therefore I won't mention where I was born, but something just struck me then and there. It made me wish I was back in the midst of that particular big city, listening to cars and trucks rumble by as I sat on my grandfather's window seat. It made me wish that I was complaining about hot weather and dirty washrooms. It made me wish that I was up on the 27th floor of my aunt's apartment building, bathing in air conditioned air and looking down at the world below, where I couldn't hear anything because the windows were never open.
And so this is my nostalgia post.
I know every experience I get, I try to savor fully. I even try to commit it to memory. But our brains are warped and every time I try to bring up a memory, it's fuzzy. There are things that may have happened, that I forget and guess about. Maybe this happened, maybe this did. What I do know, however, are the answers I studied for my test. My test answers are quite important, because they give me that mark that I covet, but I want to remember how happy I felt at a certain occasion, the inside jokes given, the laughter I shook with.
Why is this?
This shall be continued next time.