Being Happy

One leg of this whole being happy journey I've been going on involves reconnecting with nature.

I was born in 1981, and electronics have pretty much surrounded me my whole life. When I was a kid, there were some woods behind my house, and I loved those woods. I would play in the woods for hours, all the time, and I was truly happy. When I was 11, we moved from that house, and I had no woods at my disposal until recently. Sad days. I didn't realize during this time how much I needed the beauty of the woods, and I drifted further and further from the person I am, and my place in this Universe. So, things went badly.

I am very fortunate in that my husband's family has a beautiful spot in the mountains. There is a house, with a hottub, but the best part is the 14 acres of mountain woods. That I can play in. Whenever I want. Without anyone else coming...that's the key. I could have gone to parks all this time, but I don't want strangers intruding on my play time.

We spent last weekend there. I recentered more powerfully than I ever have before. I could feel happiness rolling off of me in waves. The more I looked, really looked, at all the beauty around me, the more unavoidable the happy was. So, here I stand, centered and blissfully happy.

Jon and I went treasure hunting. It started out innocently, as we were walking and happened upon these beautiful mushrooms:

The purple one fascinated me so much because it was so so slimy. Later, I found a purple one the size of my hand, pristine and just oozing with slime. I dropped it when I tripped on a root, and it broke. It was the only sad moment of the weekend.

So then, I was fascinated by everything I found. It was ridiculous. We found these treasures next.

First, the deer skull, with one antler. The other side of the antler was on the ground next to it, chewed by some small hungry animal. Then, there is that crazy fungus guy...it's purple, and looked like no mushroom I've ever noticed before. We found several turkey feathers, and saw 7 wild turkeys each morning when we woke up. There is a tom, with 6 hens...lovely. The white mushroom was so perfectly formed I had to pick it. I also found a blue stick. I was totally confused about why the stick would be blue, hanging out in the woods, but 2 days later, I figured it out. I found a half blue stick, with tiny blue fungi growing all over it, and where there was fungi, the wood turned bright blue. And then my favorite thing:

I love this piece of wood. It was from a fallen tree. The tree was huge and old, and had supported so many tiny animals in it's life. So, the tree falls and this piece of wood breaks off. So, you would think that was the end of the road for the tree, right? But nature is awesome. Turns out that a slowly rotting piece of dead tree is the perfect host for this fungus. Which is so pretty! I don't know what it is, but it just represented how everything works together for me. I thought, while I looked at that, of one of the pieces of very old advice in a post I wrote earlier. If you haven't read that, go read it now, then come back. Specifically, this piece of wood reminded me "You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should." And people, that is such a good good thought to me.

I'd end this post with that thought, but I have more treasures to show you. After I found all the beautiful mushrooms, I decided to make a tiny mushroom garden for Jon to photograph. So I spent a completely silly amount of time. creating my garden. I think it was worth the time. Do you agree?

My drinking glasses are Smurf glasses, covered in mushrooms...I couldn't shake the thought as we were doing this that it would be the perfect place to catch a little Smurf. Hope you enjoyed the pictures as much as I enjoyed finding the treasures in them!