Joy

By the skin of my teeth (that really is a weird saying, I personally don't have skin on my teeth, I just brushed them), I'm writing today's post.

Joy. If I'm writing about joy I saw today, it would be about the little girl sitting behind us at the hockey game when the song "Let It Go" started playing. Her face was full of joy.

Oh, to be a child again and experience such simple joy. I remember it fondly. The joy of Christmas morning, the joy of my birthday, the joy of getting a special treat like ice cream.

As an adult I have forgotten how to experience the simplicity of joy. At least I had for awhile.

A few years ago, I volunteered at a lunch. It was hosted by Quota and was for deaf adults who had no family. There were only fifteen men and women in the group. Our Quota members purchased gifts for them. We had wish lists, so the shopping was simple.

Watching them open their gifts and seeing the joy on their faces reminded me of the joy I am talking about here in this post. That Christmas season, I was renewed by the spirit of joy. I had seen a light shine in each person. I had seen the simplicity that is joy.

It's not complicated or difficult to experience. I think sometimes I have started to experience joy when I have been quieted by stares and awkward glances. I like to dance and I don't care if I'm not good at it. When I'm at a concert and I'm in the moment, joy is going to emit. But social graces have sometimes told me otherwise. Or friends have asked me to stop. I guess it's because I'm embarrassing them. The question is, why have I let them stop my joy?

I haven't always let them stop me.

I will leave you with this photo that says it all (from Chandra and Jason's wedding in 2009)

If the shoe fits...

I am thankful for fried chicken, it was so yummy, but I'm going to write about what we did yesterday.

Our town may not be big enough for The Body Shop, but it's just the right size for me. We have hockey, we have baseball, we have a symphony, ballet and an opera house. We have multiple theaters (as in the theatre, not cinema but we have those too), musical stages, free art events throughout the year, ArtPrize, and an amazing sculpture garden. We have an art museum, public museum, a children's museum and a presidential museum.

We may not ever be able to host the Olympics, but we get to see professionals play sports (Bill almost got hit by a foul ball thanks to Omar Infante when he was back from an injury playing for the Whitecaps) and we don't have to take out a loan to pay for tickets.

Rush hour traffic means you'll be stuck an extra ten minutes. Trust me, after driving in Memorial weekend traffic on the Jersey shore, rush hour anywhere is laughable.

Okay, depending on where you're going in Grand Rapids, and what happened it could take an extra twenty minutes. But that only happened once. And it was a double whammy, road construction and an accident.

What I'm trying to say is, this is a great place to live. There's a reason we've made so many different top ten lists.

Last night we went out for our annual hockey game with friends, Amy and Adam. We had great seats and at $16/ticket, it's a cheap date.

But don't count dinner. We always go to our favorite restaurant, San Chez. They specialize in Mediterranean tapas. We always get carried away and order way more food than we really need. It's easy to do since we're all sharing the plates of food.

I'm thankful that we can have a fun night out with good friends watching hockey for fairly cheap. And, remember that rush hour drive time, everything is close enough that we were home by 10:15pm. In other cities it would have taken an hour or longer to get home from a venue like a hockey arena.

Grand Rapids is just the right size.

Friday nights and Saturday mornings

Last night Bill and I went to dinner and a Griffins hockey game with our friends Amy and Adam. We went to San Chez, a local tapas restaurant that is one of many around here that gets as much food locally, and seasonally, as it can. We ate too much, our excuse being that Amy is pregnant and eating for two. We didn't want her to feel awkward, so the rest of us ate more than we needed. Then after calling the loan officer to pay our bill, we headed over to the Van Andel arena to watch the Griffins pull a win out of the behinds. Seriously, I'm pretty sure the local high school teams can play better hockey than they played last night. And all the guys who have been over in Detroit playing for the Wings were back. However they acted as though they had been playing golf, baseball or tennis what with the lack of keeping the stick on the ice. It was amusing and highly shocking when they finally did pull out the win. But we all had fun and I caught a t-shirt. This is important. Last year when they threw the shirts down from above, I stood up to catch it and almost lost my balance. I was wearing my "boots" (chunky heels) and may have had some wine at dinner. If you know me at all, you know balance is not my friend. I fall to some degree at a regular rate of at least once a week. That's another post; for now you just need to know that last night, when they threw the shirts, I was prepared. I had the stance and knew that the shirt would come right at me. And it did! There was no one around with their arms out. It came straight for me and as I reached up for it, no one blocked me. The skies opened (read no out-stretched arms) and like a slow-motion scene from "Miracle on Ice" I caught the free t-shirt. If Sami read my blog, she would be so proud!

Since it is Saturday and we have nothing to do, I'm sitting here listening to NPR's, "Wait, wait. Don't tell me", still in my pj's with no immediate plans to do any sort of work. In fact Bill fixed breakfast. The dishes are still sitting in the kitchen waiting to be washed. They'll just have to wait. I may get around to sewing up some articles of clothing that have been piling up and need attention. But I think I'll wait until the show is over. Maybe. These are the joys of not having children.