Things to be happy about.

When buying preowned books I always look for the previous owner's comments somewhere on margins of the pages. 14,000 things to be happy about, which I bought few years ago for like 5$ on ebay, is no exception. Overall, I bought it in a pretty good condition , but some of the things mentioned in the book were underlined, some even a few times, but then thoroughly, angrily perhaps, covered with pen. I did my best to read them anyway. The one bearing most marks is "Avoiding people who make you feel guilty." Double underlined, then crossed out, multiple times.

It's been laying on my shelf for quite a long time, but I still have a soft spot for that book. I thought I would take a brief look into it again and tell you some of my faves among those 14,000 things one should be happy about.

the feel of rug under bare feet, tall people, chew face or smash mouth (kiss), eating all your snacks before the movie even starts, seeing old people holding hands, food that means love, that vacation feeling, taking a walk when the world is too much, looking back on the past with as much pleasure as you get from looking forward to the future, carrying cups of coffee out to the porch to enjoy the morning sunshine, just one day of looking terrific, showing a child how much fun life can be, a whisper impossible to resist (underlined two times), reading outside on a blanket wearing a big sweater in the autumn sun, nocturnal drinking expeditions, remembering people's names long after they've forgotten yours, making colored chalk drawings on the pavement, our lives being what our thoughts make them, lessening the impact of a horror movie by filtering it through one's fingers, getting what you want and what you need at the same time, carrying 10 books home from the library, being taken to the zoo, ancient ruins, surviving a summer job, shooting a whole roll of film in one day, controlling the largest empire on the Monopoly board, writing poetry that no one will see, blouses with Peter Pan collars, sitting down and really thinking out an attitude of yours that you are not sure of, talking to yourself, the Greek alphabet: alpha, beta, gamma, delta, epsilon, zeta, eta, theta, iota, kappa, lambda, mu, nu, xi, omicron, pi, rho, sigma, tau, upsilon, phi, chi, psi, omega, and my favourite (you know I could go on the whole day) the sound of sneakers squeaking against the floor during basketball games.

Why is that my fave? Probably because of how silly it even sounds, no one would ever think that this is something worth being happy about, but now I know. I love that sound, I really do. It reminds me of the times when I used to play, it reminds me of some teenage drama series, of achieving something like the best player of the game title, of being wild and a fighter. Never before had I though that hearing that sound made me happy, but now it truly does and I often hear it in my head.

These are just a few examples. Honestly, it's impossible to read the whole book at once, I come back to it from time to time, pick a random page and even more random line and see what's hiding there for me. Some of the things listed are pretty doable, or shall I say, easy to get to experience, others pose more symbolical associations. You can find a bunch of meals, cities, sayings, slogans, song or movie titles among the pages. Some are personal, some universal. Wouldn't it be amazing to try to capture some of those "things" on film?

"Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have."

Thank you so much for all the beautiful words you've said under the previous post, using that new Helios lens is a real blast, it really makes magic happen and I am so so glad you share this opinion! Thanks for all that positive feedback! ♥