Marvelous Monday

A while back, after the film "The Bucket List" (Jack Nicholson/Morgan Freeman) was released, I realized that we are being steadily (and stealthily) encouraged to think of the lack in our lives; things we haven't bought, places we haven been, events we must attend, and on and on.....

So, I took a whole page out of my daily journal and began to write down all the places I have been, interesting foods I've eaten, artists whose work I've seen in museums, famous people in whose company I have been, etc.  The lists were impressive, and I'm just a fairly untraveled and ordinary woman in late mid-life.

And where are you right now??  Have I been there?  One day many years ago, I was standing in a forest glade next to a burbling stream with the springtime sun beaming down through fresh green leaves (almost heaven!!).  This enchanted place was just a few minutes by car from where I lived.....  Suddenly I realized that it was a major destination spot for tourists and here I was, a local, free to visit whenever the spirit moved me with the tourists considering me so fortunate to live close by.  Like the old story goes - how many Manhattan-ites have never been to the top of the Empire State Building?

So get out a piece of paper and start writing - people, events, and places will come to mind that you had forgotten.  Then, when you've enriched your life by noting the many pluses (and ignored the lacks) go out and look at the sky, smell the breeze, pick up a fall leaf, and know that it is a wondrous and unique experience - full of promise.