I am now home, dear reader. The Lake Superior forest surrounds me again. Ahhh…it is always so good to return home, to return to the steady earth beneath our feet. So good to travel; so good to make one’s way home.
Would you like to hear some of the happenings of the last part of the trip, for which I am so grateful?
1. Of course, I am grateful to have visited Melinda and Cheyenne. What an amazing opportunity! Both friends, who live so differently, offered the different slices of their lives to share. Both gave so much. Both helped me to deepen in spiritual practice and to surrender to the inner joy which always exists within–no matter what the external world reflects. Thank you, dear sisters, for the gifts of your homes and mountains and families. I am in deep appreciation of both of you from my lowlands along Lake Superior’s shore.
2. When Cheyenne dropped me off at the Holiday Inn in Reno, I had two choices. #1: spend the night in the motel room, playing on the computer (perhaps writing a blog) and soaking in the bathtub. Or #2: go explore the city. WaaaHOOOO! I went and explored the city!! Yes!! Took Bus #9 and traveled through my own nervousness and fear to eventually dine in the most magnificent Mexican restaurant on sizzling chicken faijitas and pico de gallo and excellent refried beans and rice and salty chips.
Even when the bus refused to show up at the end of the evening, I was gifted to find a taxi driver (from Taylor, Michigan–can you imagine??) who drove me back to the Holiday Inn. It was a magical night. And it was magical because I overcame some resistance and fear to explore the Unknown. And the Unkown proved to be good.
#2: Am now in love with Alaska Airlines (also known as Horizon Air). They were such an intimate airline. I kid you not. The woman who checked in my baggage also checked us in at the gate upstairs in Reno. How cool is that? I felt like a family member was holding my hand. (And the desk lady at the Holiday Inn actually drove the shuttle to the airport at 5 a.m. and told me her mama would be our air traffic controller today. No kiddin’. Reno is awesome!)
#3: I love it when things go wrong and you can still feel joyful. That’s what happened a lot in the past 24 hours. Things went wrong here and there and here again. But still my inner spirits were so happy that it seemed like everything was flowing perfectly.
#4: I love when your airplane can be delayed two hours in Los Angeles and you feel happy and grateful and content. And then your airplane can be delayed in Chicago and so you can arrive late, wait another four hours, and still feel like it doesn’t matter. Don’t you love those times in life?
#5 And then you can meet your husband’s boss’ wife sitting in the airport in Chicago and commune for a couple of hours while you’re waiting for your flight. So then you can both leave one another for a few minutes and know your baggage is SAFE. Isn’t that lovely?
# 5 And, furthermore, don’t you love it, when your plane finally takes off winging back towards the forest and Lake Superior…and you volunteer to take your husband’s boss’ wife to her daughters house…and then you eventually get in your car at 11:30 p.m. and your CAR LIGHTS DO NOT WORK and you still feel happy, happy, happy?
(Are you all gagging with all this inner happiness now? Ha ha, you should go meditate in Lake Tahoe with my friend Cheyenne for a couple of days and you, too, will be happy when your airplanes are late and your car lights do not work!)
#6: You remain somewhat happy–well, mostly happy–well, mostly not visibly annoyed–as you hold your bright lights on for the 20 minute drive into Marquette and make plans to find a motel to spend the night because there is NO WAY you are driving 80 miles in the dark when you’re tired jamming on the bright lights holding them manually in place with your left hand.
#7: And then true happiness really strikes when you realize you have secured one of the last rooms in the motel and you are finally lying your tired head on the pillow at 12:30 a.m.
#8: True happiness is realized when we realize that happiness is something which is inside us, no matter what external circumstances present themselves. Honest.
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. 🙂
Happy no matter what is my motto, even when I am reserving the right to bitch about the no matter what! Your blog post is so authentic and real life happy that it does NOT set my teeth on edge. It just makes me happy to be part of your Universe, Kathy.
Oh phew, Carla, I am SO GLAD I did not make you gag with happiness. ha ha…but I love your thought “reserving the right to bitch about the no matter what.” I reserve that right too! (Although I am so happy right now I don’t need it…yet!) 🙂
Kathy
Thanks so mch for sharing your trip. It gives be ideas for a trip as well.
I am also very grateful that your have shared so much about the friendships, sharing, and spiritual awareness.
You reminded me if Snoopy, Happiness is………(a warm dog).
Take care my friend and enjoy being home once again.
Kim
Butterfliesgalore.wordpress.com
Hi Kim! It’s taken me awhile to get caught up on comments. Happiness is a warm dog–just ask my friend Melinda (from that first mountaintop!) She would say happiness is three warm doggies…
Welcome back – may your happiness endure.
Barb, there you go. May this happiness endure. Well, it’s endured since Friday! What is strange about this happiness is that it seems not to be dependent on external circumstances. Yep, may this endure. And may everyone else have some of it too!
It was a comedy workshop, really- stand up? Stand up for Meditators. “Be Here Now, Dammit”. You are HIGHlarious. Glad to have you home. Love from the Line, S
You are so friggin’ funny, Suzi! Be here now, Dammit! That is a riot. Highlarious. I should write a campaign for meditation and you can be the ad manager, Ms. Baum!
Happy looks good on people. feels great and is always in vogue! I love happy! It feels sooooo good! It’s a choice, we have lots of them. Happy people live longer too! People like you and me, we’re gonna live to be 100!!! 😀 Thanks for sharing your happy-ness Kathy!!!
Deborah, it is so wonderful to see you here on this-here happy blog. 🙂 YOU almost always have a smile on your face, too. So we’re gonna live until we’re 100? OK, meet you in the nursing home! No, never mind, maybe we won’t even need the nursing home… 🙂
Wow, Kathy! I can feel your open, yeilding and perfect happiness!
I feel when we are able to assimulate this natural happiness into our being, this spontaneous yeilding, the mysteries of God reveal themselves.
I feel this happiness too!!! Drinking your presence and open heart!
Welcome Home, Dear Kathy!
in love!
cheyenne
Cheyenne, you’re here too! (Anyone else who is reading these comments, this is Cheyenne, the friend I visited up in Tahoe. She’s a big reason for this happiness! She helped me find that inner wellspring which opens for all of us… thanks again, dear friend, for the wonderful visit.)
Welcome back Kathy! Initially I thought the first photo was of rocks with frothing water, until I read that it was mountains and clouds! How neat!
I’m glad you found a place to rest in Marquette…and that you are safely home now!
Dawn, isn’t that an amazing view of the mountains and clouds? I loved the way this picture turned out. And was so happy to get a room in Marquette. You can’t imagine how happy…
It is good to be consciously happy – even while reserving the right….
Glad you’re home, sweetie – and happy, happy, happy! 🙂
Cindy, we must always reserve the right to…shall we say…complain a bit? 🙂 I am happy to be home. Sunny skies, but oh so windy, eh?
Yay! Uplifting and full of powerful energy. Thank you, sweet lady. Welcome “home.”
Love,
Susan
Can you feel the energy across the bay, Susan? Please share some of it!
Will you be happy when you get the repair bill for your car’s lights? 😉
J/K…your happiness is contagious as I now feel happy.
Scott, you know, my husband shared your question!! He was much more concerned about the cost of that repair bill… But he caught the happy bug too and he’s…well…at least smiling a tiny bit. (But it was the third vehicle which refused to cooperate this week, so he was under more stress than me coming from a week-long vacation with friends…) Glad you caught the bug too!
It’s a guy thing. My vehicles always seem to act up just before or after a vacation, too.
Wonderful post, Kathy. Always love the photos from planes… the top one is a stunner.
I’m glad you enjoyed this, Christine. Hard to believe it was a week ago flying above those cloud-mountains.