I spent a day a while back with a woman I haven't been able to forget.
She's a distant relative. I had never seen her before, and I may never see her again. The first thing she said when we met was, "You are stunning!" Wow, I liked her right off the bat.
We spent the day driving around, looking at some old family landmarks. She thought the trees were stunning. The buildings were stunning. I swear, if I had picked up a rock, she would have said it was stunning. It was almost as if she'd been dropped down from Mars and had never seen Earth before. Everything was absolutely stunning. (So much for me.)
Through the course of the day, I went from thinking she was a little odd to thinking she was one of the most amazing people I've ever met and wishing I could be more like her.
I also found out that her sunshiny attitude didn't come out of an easy or perfect life.
She had experienced a serious medical event - a brain aneurysm. She lost her career. She'd suffered a failed marriage. She'd experienced a number of other problems, large and small, just like anyone else. And yet she was unrelentingly positive.
Her lingering medical condition had resulted in some concentration problems, she explained, which explained the way she mentioned downsides of her life only in passing - while she noticed the next stunning structure, stick, or person. She doesn't have the ability to dwell on negatives. She lives in the moment, completely, utterly, blissfully.
By the end of the day, I was thinking, I want a brain aneurysm!
I spent a day a while back with a woman I haven't been able to forget.
She's a distant relative. I had never seen her before, and I may never see her again. The first thing she said when we met was, "You are stunning!" Wow, I liked her right off the bat.
We spent the day driving around, looking at some old family landmarks. She thought the trees were stunning. The buildings were stunning. I swear, if I had picked up a rock, she would have said it was stunning. It was almost as if she'd been dropped down from Mars and had never seen Earth before. Everything was absolutely stunning. (So much for me.)
Through the course of the day, I went from thinking she was a little odd to thinking she was one of the most amazing people I've ever met and wishing I could be more like her.
I also found out that her sunshiny attitude didn't come out of an easy or perfect life.
She had experienced a serious medical event - a brain aneurysm. She lost her career. She'd suffered a failed marriage. She'd experienced a number of other problems, large and small, just like anyone else. And yet she was unrelentingly positive.
Her lingering medical condition had resulted in some concentration problems, she explained, which explained the way she mentioned downsides of her life only in passing - while she noticed the next stunning structure, stick, or person. She doesn't have the ability to dwell on negatives. She lives in the moment, completely, utterly, blissfully.
By the end of the day, I was thinking, I want a brain aneurysm!
That seems a little drastic, though.
But since that day, whenever I find myself feeling down, I think of her and look around for something stunning.
The morning sun peeking pink and gold over the hills is stunning. The sound of my goats bleating in their yard is stunning. Fluffy chicken butts running across the grass are stunning. Sheep grazing in the dew-glistened meadow are stunning. Dogs sleeping on the porch are stunning. The sound of children running up and down stairs is stunning.
In every day, in each moment, if you want to find it, if you want to see it, there is something stunning.
It's all in your perspective.
Writer Suzanne McMinn lives in Roane County, where she writes every day in her blog, Chickens in the Road, at www.suzannemcminn.com.
