Hand Me Downs

Oh dear.  If rainy days AND Mondays get a person down, we’re up a creek!   When I was in high school, I used to keep a binder called The Complete and Unabridged Happy List.  I kept the thing on hand and updated on a regular basis for a couple of years.  It’s on my book shelf and contains thousands of the things that make me happy, all printed out from the Apple IIE on the dot matrix printer on paper with the little holey-tear-offs on the side.  I’m gonna add a picture soon.  Words, words….  there’s some Hamlet for you…  getting all “blah” again…  

Thing about a happy list is that it cuts a coupla ways.  If you’re down and hurting, oftentimes the last thing you care to see is the damned happy list.  Like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured on soda, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.  Proverbs 25:19-21  I dig how tactile this Proverb is- it’s made for people like me who are very in touch with their five senses.  

Conversely, it’s kind to give someone a cozy blanket on a cold day.  Eh?

Maybe it’s an indicator of growing up that my Happy List gave way to Thankfuls with some sweet girls after college.  For years- maybe seven?-  we sent regular lists to one another of things we were thankful for. 

 I think our culture at large might often err in the other direction, though.  Sometimes.  I read a twitter about my song All The Way Down Here where someone called it the saddest song ever written, and I surely felt like that when I wrote it.   And am very thankful for being able to put it into word and music, for myself and others.  But does it signify that I was awfully proud of hearing it called the saddest song?  Makes me feel so legitimate and…serious.  

I’ve been writing an awful lot of happy music these recent years, and I think they’re no less significant.   As C.S. Lewis said, joy is the serious business of heaven.  Joy and happiness…fine line, but lots of overlap.  It’s amazing how simple joys can be such good medicine- I think it’s part of why I spend so much time relishing them.  There is sorrow enough in the world, and we are called to look at it, to feel it, artists by trade and others who are called to make, whether they are as aware of it or not.   So I’m glad that there’s a ton of delight, too.  What kind gifts from a good Giver. 

A few delights for the morning as I look over the week, to combat the gray blahs- I’d love yours.

-Good coffee and Good Coffee by Wes Browning, music by Kenny Hutson

-Kind little tweets.

-A squeeze on the shoulder.  

-The tomato plants still seem keen to live, even in the torrential rain.

-Kenny flying home from Texas after rocking them.  Texas has now been rocked.  Come home, Kenny.

-Denis and Margie visiting!

-Family visiting!

-Mas Tacos Por Favor.  The fish tacos.  Spicy yogurt dill sauce and fresh cilantro.  I would eat them in a box, with a fox, in the morning, without warning.

-Most things that C.S. Lewis said.  

-This video.  Ready Set Bumbo 

-And this one. 

A little leaven to the squishy gray day.  Tell me more.