Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Pleasure

Everyso often I ask myself what has made me very very happy. I don't think we ask ourselves that enough. And the question isn't what does one look forward to but what in the act of it was very fulfilling. I will share 5 such things in no order.

1. Working on a series of records relating to the District of Columbia. This is one of those things where I get surprised by the joy of discovery. It pulls together experience and knowledge and makes me forget time.

2. Recently, on our honeymoon the view of the valley and mountains of California. It was the landscape slowly showing its beauty and me being taken by it. That feeling of pleasure of seeing something so lovely. Also on the same honeymoon, Bodega Bay, seeing the waves crash on rocks. Also the feeling of being awed by nature. Unlike the valleys and mountains that had human input, with the farms, wineries, and little McMansions tucked in the mountains, the bay was purely the creation of our Lord.

3. Eating good food. On our honeymoon it was my first course of foie gras, butter, tasty butter. At home it is when my comfort dish of pasta salad finds that 'just right' combination of oil and cheese and heat.

4. Seeing ET aka Nora Bombay again. Gotta get to Chicago.

5. Singing a really, really good hymn. For our wedding I picked a few hymns that I really enjoy and that would fit the wedding better than some other hymns I enjoy that tend to be about death and the blood of Christ all over the place. The exit hymn, our Best Woman/ matron of honor, said, I gotta sing this, and russled around for a program for "Lord of All Hopefulness." Something quivers in me when a good hymn is sung and better yet, when I get to sing it too.

Yes, I do take some pleasure in my husband, but right now it is being balanced out with the frustration of finding space for all his.... 'stuff'. Also with trying to get him to do certain things that won't drive me nuts, which I won't go into here. Yet there was that moment when unpacking more of his stuff I pulled out a block of high end knives and exclaimed, "THIS, was worth marrying you for!" There was much pleasure in being the proud new owner of some really nice knives. But, then I said the same thing when we got a shiny French copper pan for a wedding gift.

Ummmmmmmmm, copper.

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