Happiness

Had kind of a rough day yesterday.

Running errands with Ryan, I got hung up on his negativity and talked myself well into a terrible mood. After giving up and sleeping for a couple hours, I awoke to find Ryan gone, yet all the cars and bicycles accounted for. Somewhat panicked, I called him. He said he was out walking. Asked me to come pick him up. He was out close to the lake, near where Clifton Blvd meets the Shoreway. (A long ass walk from our house.)

As I drove the several miles to get him, I thought a lot about what had been bothering me that day. I had gotten so hung up on how negative everything that had come out of his mouth all day seemed to me, I had failed to recognize that the things he was ranting about were things that he ultimately sees as hindrances to his ideal future for us. Hindrances to HIS search for happiness.
And then I got that while I was getting angry at him for bitching about how fucked we'll be if Romney gets elected, about how fucked we are to not have the money to follow our dreams (let alone buy groceries and pay bills on time), bitching about how this sucks and that sucks while all I wanted to do was look at the amazing fall colors on the trees as we drove to the shops... I got that we were essentially doing the exact same thing.

Looking for happiness.

The difference is that to Ryan, happiness is some place in our future. Some ideal that he is striving for with all his might. But me? I've lost that. I got that what I feel is that I no longer have the ability to fantasize about the future. All I have anymore... is now.

And that's not because of some sort of fear. It's just that cancer has changed the way I see things... The way I see EVERYTHING, really. The way I live. The way I feel things. The way I appreciate and enjoy things. Going back to the car ride to the shops during which Ryan was angrily going on about asshole Romney... All I could think was how I was pretty sure I'd never REALLY noticed before this year how unbelievably beautiful autumn leaves are. And I didn't really think of it in a "how sad" kind of way... but in a thankful way -  just happy that it finally occurred to me to enjoy it.

I feel like if cancer did any one thing for me, above ALL else, it woke me the fuck up. It made me live TODAY more than I ever thought I would. And in doing that, it helped me to find happiness in every little moment of every day. It made me stop caring so much about tomorrow. Because for me, now, today is all there is.

And I don't mean that in a fearful way. But really in a fear-LESS way. What I have to accept, now, is that this thing that made me fearless, made me embrace my mortality, made me learn how to let the littlest things bring me happiness... It's the same thing that has robbed the people I love of their invincibility, has made them fearful, and made their searches for their own happiness both more important AND more difficult.

I have to remember to be patient with Ryan. To not read his muttering as negativity, but rather as just "fuck"-laden verbalizations of his own quest for the happiness my simple ass now finds in clouds and leaves and smiles and junk.

Xxo, Phoebe