It was a perfect day and so we did what anyone would do, we went on another picnic. Actually, it would appear that picnic season has officially begun as I am getting swifter at packing the two china plates, the silver wrapped in napkins. I carefully tuck in the wine and glasses and then select an array of charcuterie and cheeses. This is good time food.
It is why we go. For here we are too noise-filled, too hemmed in. In the country – and specifically in the shadows of a cabanon that makes us dream – we find peace. And in that peace, happiness.
It is something that I have been thinking of lately – yes, again – the fleeting aspect of that particular bluebird and yet how so often we assume it is our right for her to flutter around us, keeping us company, permanently. No, I see that it doesn’t work like that – just as it is useless to chase after that other fickle feathered friend, Youth – the less I demand it, the more it arrives. I do love those rare moments when I can feel everything fold into itself and I am in it, knowing how very good it is. It can be as simple as Remi throwing a stick to Ben and Kipling in the distance. In my watching then seeing, I know.
I would like to share with you two quotes and a bit of poetry…
“But as I try and understand how life works – and why some people cope better than others with adversity – I keep coming back to something to do with saying yes to life, which is love of life, however inadequate, and love for the self, however found. Not in the me-first way that is the opposite of life and love, but with a salmon-like determination to swim upstream, however choppy upstream is, because this is your stream…What the Americans, in their constitution, call the ‘right to the pursuit of happiness’ (please note, not ‘the right to happiness’) is the right to swim upstream salmon-wise.”
-Jeanette Winterson, from her quietly amazing and very poignant memoir, “Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?”
“Pursuing happiness, and I did, and I still do, is not at all the same as being happy – which I think is fleeting, dependent on circumstances, and a bit bovine.
If the sun is shining, stand in it – yes, yes, yes. Happy times are great, but happy times pass – they have to – because time passes.
The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is life-long, and it is not goal-centered.
What you are pursuing is meaning – a meaningful life.”
-Jeanette Winterson, “Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal?”
“i thank you God for this most amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of the trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes.”
– e.e. cummings
I hope that your spring is full of good things growing.
And that they are not passing at such speed that you don’t see them.
Or if the buds haven’t bloomed yet, know that you planted the seeds long ago.
They will.
Just find the footpath, no matter how buried it might seem to be…and stay on it.
Have a wonderful week everyone…more on the Fondation Vincent Van Gogh soon…
Look all of these really lovely and gracious comments! Looking back, I wonder WHAT was going on with me at the time that I didn't respond properly…just putting a very belated "I'm sorry" out there into the cyber universe…
I love this post!! Yes, it's everything I believe, too – thank you for sharing those quotes and poems, which compliment your words and photos so well. My spring is full of things growing – I hope they end up to be good! And your one line, "and that they are not passing at such speed that you don't see them", reminded me of some lines from the song I wrote for Dad – "Slow Down". "Oh I know you too well, I knew you'd say there aren't roses to smell; life whizzes by, gardens fly past; a rose is not a rose when it's going that fast". Here's to stopping to smell – and photograph – them!
Such a beautiful post… I hope the bluebird rests on your shoulder today, if only for an instant. xo