how things go....

I'm often "almost" (and I put "almost" always in parentheses ) embarrassed  by how good my life goes when not many can claim that.

But I'm not.

What if 'how things go' for you and me is a choice we make? How would that be?

What if we choose to find life 'good' in spite of the nooks and crannies that show up?

What if that were true?

This I know: I have a lot of pain these days. My joints hurt to beat the band--and I'm usually not good with pain. But I push on and find what goes good and value that more than what goes bad.

I just read a novel by Louise Penny, my new favorite writer, A Rule Against Murder, that had a character named Mr. Finney who is rejected by almost everyone and is described as the ugliest man ever by the novelist. He tells the main character, a detective in Quebec named Gamache, that he is sitting by the lake of a Canadian resort, "doing his sums".

Finney is an accountant married to a very rich woman and Gamache assumes Finney is thinking about money.

Later in the novel, Finney tells Gamache that "doing his sums" is no more than "counting his blessings". This horribly ugly, rejected man finds reasons to be full of joy by 'counting his blessings'.

What if we choose to find life 'good' in spite of the ugliness and rejection of it all?

What if that were true.

The reason I'm 'almost' embarrassed by how good my life is when I 'do my sums' is that I'm white, middle-class and have loved the same woman for nearly 50 years and have two great children and three marvelous granddaughter and live, for God's sake, in Cheshire, Connecticut. How could my life not be good?

But for many white, middle-class people in Cheshire, life doesn't 'show up' as 'good'.

What if the quality of life we experience is a choice?

I've met people who come from horrid circumstances who, I think, 'choose' to have life be 'good' and live and lean into the goodness. Their 'sums', their blessings turn out--by their 'choice' to be more than what is bad.

Ponder all that.

What if 'joy' is a choice we make rather than the circumstances we encounter?

What if that's true?

Something to ponder that would turn the way we think about life upside-down. Choice trumping circumstance would be something to write home about...and the shout to the heavens....