Those Endless Days

Trust me, I really do appreciate how annoying it is when a person is persistently positive. 

Chirpy McChirpface in the face of obvious and insidious disaster. 
Little Miss Smiles when all around there is doom and gloom.
Bonnie Langford in a room full of Fr Stones. 

But I just can't help myself. 
I keep seeing so many good things in the world at the moment. Some of them are cringe-level stuff, like my children's snuggles or the bright yellow daffodils outside my window. Others are a bit more tangible, like the lazy mornings spent in PJs and tea-drinking, when we would otherwise be roaring at each other about swimming gear and money for football and no you can't wear those wellies to ballet. 

No restrictions on peanut butter usage.
No lunchboxes.
No uniform washing.
No near-fights with parents who believe that leaving the engine on in their 4x4 outside the school gates is perfectly acceptable behaviour.

More tea.

Witnessing the affirmation that the people who you knew were Good turn out to be Even Better.
Witnessing the corollary, and feeling smug about it. 

Remembering the times when I had to stay away from other people because they might make me sick, or they had to stay away from me because I might make them sick, and feeling that the world has a smidge more understanding now of how that felt. 

And yes, the fish in the Venice canals (although I am not so sure about the veracity of that one).

Technology turning out to be really quite easy to use, after all. People. 

Watching how a bit of motivation can encourage the most recalcitrant. 

Gardening.

Having a clean house and not resenting it.

Not having to wheel the same trolley around the same aisles buying the same food and queuing and paying and packing and unpacking and repeating. 

Feeling glad that the availability of hairdressers/nail technicians/tanning salons/teeth whiteners is entirely irrelevant to me. (I do miss my physiotherapist though).

I have a house with enough rooms in it that we can all spend time apart comfortably. 
I have a garden with flowers and vegetables and rusty scooters and goalposts and at least seven footballs. 
I have access to books, movies, TV series, video calls, music, paper, Scrabble. 
I can see greenery out of all of my windows. 
I don't have all the different foods that I might want or desire, but I have a grocery delivery slot booked, and I can afford to order a takeaway and pay the milkman and ask the butcher to drop me in some sausages. 

I have never been a big fan of shopping malls, and I pretty much hate buying clothes and shoes and make-up. 

I have low-maintenance friends who live between 300 and 3000 miles away from me, so this separation is not new for us. 

I am safe in my home. Abuse, addiction, animosity, antipathy - these do not loom large in my household.

These days could be so much harder. 

I am thankful. 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNJcd1pTaL0