An issue of contentment

I had a short but amazing experience a few days ago. Let me tell you about it.

It was a sparkling clear October day. The oak tree next to the house was sporting extravagantly beautiful leaves. The air was crisp and just warm enough to have the windows open.

I was engaged in a canning project, probably the last one of the year. I was standing at the kitchen sink washing canning jars and watching the occasional leaf drop from the oak tree through the kitchen window.

Meanwhile Don was engaged in an outdoor project on the back porch, just off the kitchen. Through the screen door, I could hear him sawing boards and using the cordless screwdriver to fasten things together.

And I had a powerful flash-like realization: I was content. Honestly, that moment just rocketed through me. The feeling lingered for days.

I started thinking about one of my favorite historical novels, Avalon by Anya Seton. It takes place in early Medieval England, late 900s to early 1000s AD, when Viking raids were common.

Brief synopsis of the last quarter of the book: The main character, Merowyn, is kidnapped by Vikings and taken to Iceland, where she weds an Icelandic man and has a son. After a period of difficult adjustment, she grows to dearly love both her husband and her new home. Later she and a group of other Icelanders colonize Greenland, where she bears a mentally-handicapped daughter. When her husband dies twenty years later, Merowyn returns at last to England, that gentler country she missed during the cold bleak years on an ice-swept land. As a widow, she must make do as best she can and ends up marrying a man she respects but doesn't love. She thinks back to the silvery-gold early days of her first marriage and realizes she was happy then and didn't know it.

For some reason that phrase – she was happy then and didn't know it – stayed with me. And it made me wonder: how many of us are happy but don't appreciate it, know it, or realize it?

"Happiness" is such a loaded and multi-faceted word that no one can really define what it means for them. It's different for everyone. Happiness can be found even in places and circumstances you may not like; but it's often there, buried among the less enjoyable parts. Facets of happiness (contentment, satisfaction, pride of achievement, etc.) can all contribute to the overall qualities of the emotion.

I think what haunts me about the notion of being happy and not realizing it, is how many of us let overall happiness slide through our fingers because we're too concerned with little things we don't like. Anyone who takes their health for granted and then loses it, for example, will appreciate how much happier they were when their health was good.

That's why this moment of contentment was so powerful.

I recall another moment about ten years ago. It was late June. I was sitting in the barn (of our old home) working on my laptop, working on a magazine article that was due shortly. (In nice weather, I did a lot of work in the barn.) I was keeping an eye on a cow who was due to give birth at any moment. Chickens were all around me. The daisies and ocean spray were in full bloom. Later that afternoon I had plans to do dishes and laundry. That moment of contentment, again, was strong enough to be remembered.

A couple of my favorite Bible verses underscore this topic. FirstTimothy 6:6-9 says, "But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction."

And the verse that has become my motto, 1Thessalonians 4:11-12: "...make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody."

If washing canning jars while watching autumn leaves through the kitchen window while Don works on a project on the back porch qualifies ... count me in.