The weather turned today. Instead of dark, dank days full of clouds and cold winds blowing it actually felt like a summers day for a change. Taking advantage of the sunshine, my daughter and I did garden maintenance.
Cutting the grass and trimming the hedges always puts me in a brilliant mood. Well, it does if the weather is nice. I am definitely a "fair weather" gardener. So today was an excellent opportunity to rev up the old energy level and get the garden sorted. Despite my back and legs signing Aye Marie while we were sorting things out, I did not mind the discomfort at all. I can put up with quite a lot of things if the sun is shining.
My daughter and I broke for lunch. We were both happy and relaxed. I then remembered the state of my finances and immediately started losing that feeling of well being. I said as much to my daughter. She just looked at me for a minute. "You know that this is a temporary situation," she said. I replied that hopefully that was the case. I then took a minute to moan about the time off I've had from work. I felt that this did not help our situation very much either. "It feels like it is taking forever to get the problem sorted," I said. Again my daughter, the voice of reason, told me, "You know that it will get sorted, just keep exercising and walking, it will get sorted when it gets sorted." I allowed that she was again correct in her view. I then sat and listened to the quiet of the neighbourhood and relaxed.
I have been fighting the battle for happiness for about two years now. When I realised that I could no longer live my life as I had been for over twenty-five years and struck out on my own, I felt nothing short of euphoric. Well it was euphoria tinged with a bit of panic. When I left, I took all the big bills with me along with the credit cards themselves. I knew I would need them to set up my new life.
It was costly.
Everything was expensive, even the cheap things. I will admit that I did go a bit mad with spending, but not by much. I was really banking on getting a bit of overtime to help defray the cost. What I did not count on was getting injured at work. I am covered for six months at full pay, after that it drops down to half. While thats all well and good, it does not give any scope for overtime.
So the costs keep mounting and I slide further in debt while scrabbling to keep my credt rating up.
But.
I am still happier than I have been for years. I am more settled and feel free. So I guess I would have to say that happiness is a state of mind. Because everytime I start to feel panic set in, I think of all the other things I have going for me. The main one being my freedom.
I also wonder when my daughter grew up and became so wise. I think it must have been when I was so busy worrying about everything. I do have a sneaky feeling, though, that she has been that way for a long time now.
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