July

Joyful July Link Love

July 28, 2023

Photo by Ann on Unsplash

Even when we feel sorrow, we can still feel joy—sometimes in the same moment! And thank goodness for that. So while it’s boiling hot outside (at least in most of the Northern Hemisphere), let’s relax in the cool indoors and check out these links related to aspects of joy and happiness.

First up, “You Don’t Have to Be Happy to Feel Joy,” according to author Ingrid Fetell Lee. She writes, “Little moments of joy happen to us all the time, whether or not we consider ourselves happy people or not. They happen in good times and also right in the middle of stressful or miserable ones. And we all have the capacity to notice them, savor them, and make more of them.” 

Sometimes joy results from letting go of something, as Courtney Carver says in “7 Things to Let Go of for a Happier Life.” Choose the one that makes you feel the worst to let go of first. For me, that’s probably number 4. 

What Gretchen Rubin calls everyday luxuries in “Why Everyday Luxuries Help Make Us Happier,” I call simple pleasures. Potato, potahto. Some of my everyday luxuries/simple pleasures include drinking bottled iced tea rather than making it myself, fresh flowers on the kitchen table, and flavored coffee. What are some of yours? 

Your joy matters. Love what you love. 

I love the suggestions from “7 Things You Need to Do If You Want to Enjoy Life More.” Numbers 4 and 5 are on the agenda this summer.

I love ice cream—and good ice cream is definitely an everyday luxury. Check out Thrillist’s list of the best ice cream shops in the U.S. I haven’t been to a single one of these, but I’m keeping this article for reference. Is there one near you? Check it out and let me know if it lives up to its reputation. 

I’m a fan of The Minimal Mom’s approach to decluttering, and whenever I need a boost in motivation for decluttering my house I head over to YouTube to watch one of her videos. There’s something about her cheerful, matter-of-fact manner that boosts my mood. Here’s one of my recent favorites:

 



4th of July

Writing Our Names

July 09, 2014

Photo courtesy Ryan McGuire

 Introduction by Ted Kooser: I’m especially fond of sparklers because they were among the very few fireworks we could obtain in Iowa when I was a boy. And also because in 2004 we set off the fire alarm system at the Willard Hotel in Washington by lighting a few to celebrate my inauguration as poet laureate. Here’s Barbara Crooker, of Pennsylvania, also looking back.

Sparklers

We’re writing our names with sizzles of light
to celebrate the fourth. I use the loops of cursive,
make a big B like the sloping hills on the west side
of the lake. The rest, little a, r, one small b,
spit and fizz as they scratch the night. On the side
of the shack where we bought them, a handmade sign:
Trailer Full of Sparkles Ahead, and I imagine crazy
chrysanthemums, wheels of fire, glitter bouncing
off metal walls. Here, we keep tracing in tiny
pyrotechnics the letters we were given at birth,
branding them on the air. And though my mother’s
name has been erased now, I write it, too:
a big swooping I, a hissing s, an a that sighs
like her last breath, and then I ring
belle, belle, belle in the sulphuric smoky dark.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation  (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2013 by Barbara Crooker from her most recent book of poems, Gold, Cascade Books, 2013. Poem reprinted by permission of Barbara Crooker and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

July

July Pleasures

July 13, 2012



Jewel-toned fruits.
Fireworks.
Flip flops.
Baseball.
Fresh herbs.
Ice cream.
Cotton-ball clouds in cobalt skies…

July is really and truly summer. There’s no school (both June and August contain a few days of school where we live). Summer weather patterns set in and we get thunderstorms nearly every afternoon. I love to hear the rumble of thunder in the distance, watch the skies darken, hear the pounding rain. Then sun again. Sometimes we get “sunshowers”—rain and sunshine at the same time.

In July, we slow down. After all, it’s too hot and humid to do much of anything but sit. Grab a cool glass of something to drink, put your feet up and chill—usually with a good book. Yeah, that sounds pretty good. Think I’ll do that this weekend…

Every month, every season has its own pleasures. Though I like to complain about the heat and humidity, just this once I’m going to shut up and appreciate what July has to offer.

What are your favorite July pleasures?