Happiness

This week my husband told me he was happy. This may not seem like an event worth writing about but what made it special was he went on to say 'The last time I remember really feeling happy was the months prior to 911.'

Happiness is not a feeling everyone has, and should not be taken lightly by those lucky enough to feel happy. How many of us felt the world pulled out from under us after that day? Our son was 15 at the time and I remember coming in after being at work and finding him on the computer, crying.

He looked at me through his tears, not embarrassed being caught crying as he would have been a month earlier, saying 'Mom, what's going to happen now? . . . I've been looking at Nostradamus prophecies . . . .some of us were talking about what happened and someone said this was predicted by prophets. Is this the end?'

My reassurances left me with my own doubts about how life would be here in this wonderful country now touched by so much hate and destruction.

Now 6 years later, we all seem to be still struggling, us our neighbors, friends. Economically, personally. Our lives have all changed since 911. Gas prices are unmanageable for so many families already stretched to the point of not being able to pay bills. Foreclosures are at an all time high. Real estate in our 'golden crescent' neighborhood, sit month after month unsold, where previously they would be on the off the market in weeks. Bankruptcies, hoped to be curtailed by new legislation, have not slowed down one bit.

But we still strive to be happy. . . to find a silver lining. To look back and say, we're a bit better off this year than last, aren't we?

This is where I am. This is where my husband is. We think of ourselves as unique and different from our neighbors but truth be told, we're just exactly like them.