Sunday reading and zesty grinning

Ann, my blogging compatriot, says (here), in between chews on yummy Espresso Royale caramels (I love those!), that she hasn’t missed a day in posting on her blog. I’m right there, too, but it hasn’t been without challenge. When I started this blog on January 2nd, I thought that the hardest thing would be to feel motivated to write on a regular basis (at least twice a day). In fact, finding motivation has been the easiest. But finding a hospitable environment for blogging has been at times trying -- there are so many pressures in each day to do everything but blog!

And so it is always inspiring to read a few good words on this Great Blogging Project in the blog of another (see post here). Truly, to know that something you wrote would give someone even the faintest of smiles is completely gratifying. (I read your terrific blog regularly too!)

This blogger uses the words “a good enjoyer” to describe a person who takes pleasure in things. It’s true, I’ve been accused for a long time of having a wildly happy approach to each day. When I was a kid, my parents gave me the mawkishly old-fashioned label of “ray of sunshine” (we were in the 1950s, the world was less jaded, it sounded even charming then). Throughout my younger years I felt like I should act in ways to give substance to the label. Too much pressure? Not at all! I liked the role, played it effortlessly and with a great deal of zest.

But I was a misfit in my own family. My mother was moody, my father was on his own cloud and my sister was a more brooding child (she was molding her own more artistic temperament to a family structure that would not accommodate it). So there I was, all grins and happy plans, without the enthusiasm of others to match my own.

Eventually I learned to temper it somewhat. But even the greatest feeling of frustration remains always just a passing phase for me. I’ll wake up and suddenly the list of possibilities is before me. The cloud passes. I’m the kid with the zesty grin all over again.

Here’s a photo from 1958 (I’m not quite 5 years old): I am in a dining room, in the Polish mountain town of Zakopane, feeling…happy.


just another day