blue solstice

Are you happy, someone recently asked me. Sitting still for just a moment head turned to think that through I answered, no. That’s not a word I believe I am. You’re not happy? No.

Then what are you?

I’m not happy because I’ve tried that. I’ve done the dance toward something that feels uphill for me, sliding back down at the first dark twist of the full moon. The wolf howling I can’t listen to when I’m reaching for happy, cheerful.

So what are you then?

I’d like to think it’s joy I feel when I see a field of purple flowers against a white mountained backdrop, that it’s enjoyment when I sip the perfectly hot cup of coffee, sweet and held in my morning tired hands. I’d like to think it’s content I feel when I sit back against a hard day, relief and gratitude that it’s over mixed up in the choices I’ve made to bring me back to the home that holds me to the ground.

Happiness for me is a pendulum that swings too quickly back to unhappy, pulling too far one way pushes me so far the other into unhappy, discontent, apathy, and the fast fight to get back to the other side. One bad, the other good; that thinking has upended the balance that otherwise holds me suspended in the middle. Everything gathered in the small storm that is all mine, all feeling, all the time.

Happy takes explaining, and I think I’m done with that.

So you’re not happy?

No, not happy, but so many other things, that when put together make me more than happy, I’d like to think they make me just—me.