Better Weather

Don't you know you're alive...

Today was sunny. It was bright and breezy and I was rocking a ponytail and for a rare moment, wasn't inwardly straining at the thought of the piles of studying I should have been doing, or my once-again messy room.

That in itself was strange. A couple times I stopped and listened for the usual clamor of unpleasant things that shouted through my head. But there was nothing. Even when I forced myself to think of the homework I hadn't touched, it was only a flicker of remembrance. Oh, right, I thought. I'll do that. Eventually. 

But I didn't wince on the inside. 

For Mother's Day, we went to this darling cafe in downtown Fredricksburg. The woman who owned the cafe apparently liked me well enough to give me her email address, promise to come to our school's musical this weekend, and even throw out a job offer if I ever wanted one. 

Then we toured the grounds of the house of some 17th-century painter. The grounds were covered in flower bushes and tall, old trees, and small fields full of wildflowers and old wood painted white. I frolicked around in my blue shorts, my faithful Canon DSLR in tow, and scampered through uncut grass and over stone walls, twisting the zoom lens to my heart's delight, snapping photos.

At one point during lunch, I looked up from my seasoned potatoes and said suddenly, "Why am I so happy today? I'm in such a good mood." 

It was true. Normally, I'm impatient Sunday afternoons. I'm always thinking of all the things I have yet to do before the week begins again. But I was looking around me and loving what I saw. I was humming and not caring about how I looked. I was reading a book again and glad to be outside. 

That hasn't happened to me in a long while. The wonder and simplicity of inexplicable happiness. 

It's a good feeling.