Photo by Monika Grabkowska on Unsplash

It’s almost that time of year again. Summer. Some of my favorite bloggers are designing their ideal summers and creating Summer Fun Lists. Most people are looking forward to summer and are eager for the longer, warmer days to arrive.

Bah humbug.

I have mixed emotions about summer and creating a summer fun list. On the one hand, I’m all for planning for fun. On the other, I no longer get a scheduled summer vacation and I live in Florida where summer is one long procession of hot, humid days with the occasional hurricane thrown in for variety…let’s just say that summer is not my favorite.

In addition, historically I’ve had mixed results creating and fulfilling my summer fun list. I think it’s great in theory, but what it has turned into is a list of things that don’t get done that consequently makes me feel like I’m failing at the fun part of life.

I don’t want to give up on the idea altogether, though. The point of having a summer fun list is to have something to look forward to, as well as something to look back on. Too often, we allow life to drift by, filling our hours with work and chores and responsibilities and we forget to have fun.

Since Florida summers prostrate me (see above: heat, humidity, hurricanes), this year I’m going to make a super short and sweet list. Micro fun, if you please.

• Have an ice cream cone at Baskin Robbins (many of my happy growing-up memories revolve around B & R, as we fondly called it)
• Read and/or write at a café (now that I’m vaccinated)
• Create and read from a summer reading list (post to come)
• Get together with friends I haven’t seen in more than a year, because, well, you know…

This has got to be one of the most pathetic summer fun lists ever, but I’m hoping that if I loosen my grip on trying to have fun, I’ll actually have more. Who knows? It’s a work in progress.

I think what’s important here is that we do make plans for fun, but we also allow for differences in life stages, personal preferences and situations. Summer, for me, is not the time to push myself too hard. It’s the time to relax, loosen up, do less, lie on the couch and read, and conserve my energy as much as possible.

Do you love summer? Do you make seasonal fun lists? If so, why not share some of your fun plans in the comments below?

Previous summer fun lists can be found here, here, and here.

What a lovely spring we’ve had here in Florida—walks and barn visits are so much more pleasant when I’m not dripping sweat immediately after setting foot outside (TMI?). All good things must end, however, and it’s starting to get hot and humid, so I’m spending more time in the air conditioning—and more time at my computer—than I have for the past few months. Here are a few fun links I’ve discovered recently that you might enjoy. 

I love these “10 Ways to Start the Day on a Joyful Note.” Right now, I’m especially enjoying fresh flowers. I have some in my breakfast nook as well as in my bedroom.

Three words: Funny pet photos.

Since I can’t go to Paris any time soon, I’m bringing Paris to me, via “How to Pretend You’re in Paris at Home.” Starting with eating a Trader Joe’s chocolate croissant for breakfast…

My friend Kerri told me about the free Smile newsletter from inspiremore.com, and I’ve really enjoyed having happy news pop up in my in box. Subscribe here (no affiliation).

Many of the ideas in “25 Small Ways to Improve Your Life” resonate with me.

Advice I need: “How to Do Things You Keep Avoiding.” 

More help for doing things rather than putting them off: “7 Habits That Are Scientifically Proven to Help You Beat Procrastination and Tackle Your To-Do List.”  Anyone sense a trend here?

Thirty of country music’s most famous singers released one song together in honor of the 50^th anniversary of the annual CMA (Country Music Association) Awards. Read about it here, and watch the music video here.

Watch and be amazed by this high school dance team’s homecoming assembly:

Photo courtesy Chiemsee2016 via Pixabay

“Modern society is defined by an excess of opportunity. We have more information, more products, and more options than ever before.

“As a result, curating, filtering, and refining are more important skills than ever before. Those who edit best will find the signal in the noise.”

—James Clear

After a year of pandemic-related slowing down, have you “edited” your life?  What changes would you like to take forward into the future?

Reading poetry is a simple pleasure that I don’t indulge in as often as I’d like. Even though I enjoy it, it sometimes feels too “hard.” I know a lot of people feel that way, or they think poetry is boring or confusing. And it certainly can be. But it can also be funny, sweet, thought provoking, and powerful. Witness the furor caused by Amanda Gorman’s poem from this year’s presidential inauguration. 

April is National Poetry Month and in honor of that, I’m sharing a poem below, and a few links to other resources related to National Poetry Month or poetry in general. If you have any favorite poems or poets, please do share in the comments below!  

30 Ways to Celebrate the 25^th Annual National Poetry Month at Home or Online

It’s National Poetry Month—No Foolin’

Finding Solace in Poetry

American Life in Poetry has a new editor and a new look, and I still think it’s one of the best ways to get a taste of modern poetry.

Knopf Doubleday offers a free poem-a-day service during the month of April (click here to sign up for next year) and occasional news about the poets they publish.

Today’s poem, with an introduction by Ted Kooser:

It’s not at all unusu­al for a poet who’s been impressed by some­one else’s poem to think, ​“I wish I’d writ­ten THAT!” I’ve nev­er read a poem by the late Lisel Mueller — and I’ve read near­ly all of them — when I didn’t feel just that way. Mueller died at age 96 this past Feb­ru­ary [2020]. Here’s the poem that stands as an epi­graph to her Pulitzer Prize win­ning book, Alive Togeth­er: New and Select­ed Poems, pub­lished by Louisiana State Uni­ver­si­ty Press.

In Passing

We do not accept unsolicited submissions. 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 ©1996 by Lisel Mueller, “In Passing,” from Alive Together: New and Selected Poems, (Louisiana State University Press, 1996). Poem reprinted by permission of Louisiana State University Press. Introduction copyright © 2021 by The Poetry Foundation.

“There’s one!” I pointed.

The rest of the passengers on our glass bottom boat swiveled their heads to the rear of the craft, where a large mass floated beneath the surface: a manatee!

The guide gently reversed and drifted over the creature, and we could see him (her?) grazing on the grasses at the bottom of the river.

Those two blobs are manatees

My heart lifted, as we looked down into the crystal water, or up to the cobalt sky dusted with puff-ball clouds, or to the river’s banks where cypress trees dipped their toes into the turquoise water. Anhingas dried their wings and alligators lounged in the sun. For 90 minutes, we moved slowly up and down the Silver River on a glass bottom boat, while our guide told us about the springs, the wildlife, and the history of the park.  After a year of pandemic precautions, stress, and upheaval, it felt so good to be out exploring in the world.

Sometimes conditions combine to create a situation that is more than the sum of its parts. My recent visit to Silver Springs State Park was one of these experiences.

Anhinga

It started when my friend Kerri, a teacher from Washington State declared she was coming to Florida for her spring break following completion of her Covid-19 vaccinations. We’ve made it a habit to try to see each other once a year, often on her spring breaks, when we meander around the country exploring (and, of course, catching up on what’s been happening in our lives). Because of Covid and other factors, we hadn’t seen each other in three years! That’s a lot of catching up.

We decided this year to meander up central Florida and into the panhandle, where she planned to meet some friends she’d known since high school. I was game, so we set out. Our first destination is the subject of today’s Field Trip Friday.

Silver Springs

Silver Springs was one of the first tourist attractions in Florida—glass bottom boats have plied the 5.4-mile river since the 1870s and the story goes that they were invented here. But once Disney, Sea World and Universal Studios opened theme parks in the Orlando area, visitors began to drop off. The river also suffered from environmental problems associated with fertilizer runoff and septic outflow (eww). In 2013, the Florida Park Service took over control of the attraction, and merged it with the adjacent Silver River State Park, creating the current Silver Springs State Park. The Park Service seems to have done a great job restoring and preserving the river. Hiking, mountain biking, equestrian trails, camping, and various educational exhibits complete the state park complex.

A glass bottom boat tour is a great way to explore the river (choose from 30- and 90-minute options), but if you prefer, you can rent a canoe, kayak, or paddleboard. No swimming is allowed. Thirty springs make up the Silver Springs group, and the largest one, Mammoth Spring, provides about 45 percent of the flow of water.

Glass bottom boat

But we didn’t come to Silver Springs to look at water. We were hoping to see the animal “trifecta”: alligators, manatees, and believe it or not, monkeys.

We knew there’d be no problem seeing alligators. Here’s one for your viewing pleasure:

Say “cheese”

And as you know from the intro, we were lucky enough to see manatees, too. But monkeys? Why are there even monkeys at the park? Well, it seems that in 1938, entrepreneur Colonel Tooey decided to bring monkeys to Silver Springs to enliven his Jungle Cruise boat ride. He placed his primates on an island in the river, not realizing that the monkeys could swim (apparently he thought he was buying non-swimming squirrel monkeys rather than the rhesus macaques he wound up with). All the monkeys escaped the island, and their descendants swing through the trees along the Silver River, as well as spreading out into the Ocala National Forest and other areas. (The monkeys can be aggressive and some carry a virus harmful to people, so we weren’t tempted to get close to them. This photo was taken with a long camera lens!)

Silver Springs on the silver screen

You may have caught glimpses of Silver Springs on the silver screen. Scenes from Rebel Without a Cause, Moonraker, Creature From the Black Lagoon, six Tarzan movies, and Sea Hunt were all shot here. In fact, you can still see props from several shows in the clear water, including sunken statues used in the 1960s Bill Cosby/Robert Culp show I Spy.

“Nothing is so personal as happiness; each soul is fitted for a joy entirely individual; often a whole life is required to discover it.”

—Jeanne de Vietinghoff, The Understanding of Good

What are some things that make you happy? 

One thing that makes me happy—travel/road trips! I just returned from a quick road trip with my friend Kerri (she’s fully vaccinated and I’m halfway there), and there would have been a Field Trip Friday today except that I’ve been wrestling with my computer much of last night and today. First it hid my photos, then it ate my blog post. Twice. So stay tuned—trip adventures and photos to follow. (I took the one above on Panama City beach.)

Javier Allegue Barros on Unsplash

It’s been about a year since the COVID-19 pandemic upended our lives. And it’s also been a year, if you know what I mean. In addition to a pandemic, so many other awful things happened—or were revealed—during 2020. I’ve been trying to come up with some thoughts to mark the occasion, but the document for this post has been open on my computer for two weeks! The Year That Must Not Be Named has left me speechless.

Well, almost. Here are a few thoughts…

Surviving, not thriving

Most of us have experienced a year of isolation, confusion, frustration, fear, and sorrow. But if we’ve been lucky, it’s also been a year of small pleasures, slowing down, and deep thankfulness. Pretty much the same as any year, but much more intense. Anyone who lived through 2020 has likely been changed forever in some way. Think about what you were looking forward to at the start of last year, the things that took up much of your attention. How have they changed? What has become more important to you, or less so?

I’m disappointed that I didn’t produce any brilliant work, make sourdough bread, or learn a new skill (I did complete a year of French practice on Duolingo. Je regrette to say I’m nowhere near being skillful, let alone fluent). But I did keep our household stocked with food and other essentials (including toilet paper) and we all survived, even my husband who actually had COVID. For me, 2020 was about surviving. Some seasons of life are just about surviving, and perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised by that. 2021 has not been much different yet, but there are signs that things are slowly changing.

A shot in the arm

Last week I got my first dose of vaccine against COVID. My planner is starting to fill up again, with a haircut here, and an outdoors coffee date there. I’m taking a Florida road trip with my friend Kerri. And while I haven’t reserved the ticket yet, I’m tentatively planning a trip to visit my mom in California sometime later this year. Provided it seems relatively safe to do so.

And while last year was mostly a long, slow nightmare, no experience is wasted—even the pandemic ones. As we stumble toward a new normal (should we call it “nermal” with apologies to Garfield cartoonist Jim Davis?), ask yourself, “What have I learned about myself this past year? How has it changed me? Have I made changes I want to bring forward into the future? 

I still feel like I’m picking up the pieces of my life and trying to fit them into a new pattern. Nothing gets put back in without scrutiny. Does it belong here? Or here? Or maybe it doesn’t fit at all anymore. This is going to take some time.

Szilvia Basso on Unsplash

“Belief in happiness is not an illusion of youth, as is often assumed, but the experience of a force that grows and triumphs over reality. The more our feeble hope is flung and broken against the deceptions of life, the more surely will it rise powerful and transformed.”

—Jeanne de Vietinghoff, The Understanding of Good

Early yesterday morning I pulled out my planner/calendar and a small stack of embellishments—stickers, washi tape, etc. Snuggled up in my bed, sipping coffee with Luna sleeping next to me, I decorated my month-at-a-glance pages for March and April, choosing inspirational, encouraging words as well as colorful stickers and tape. After that, I decorated my weekly spreads for the month of March. I spent probably 45 minutes to an hour of my precious early morning quiet time matching colors, and looking for words that will gently encourage or inspire.

Why is this significant?

Because I haven’t wanted to do this, or indeed even felt able to, for almost a year. Why bother, when I wasn’t going anywhere except the grocery store or the barn? Even though I still used my daily planner, I didn’t care what it looked like. When the to-dos on my list never varied from the mundane daily “keep us alive” chores week after week, I didn’t have the mental energy to make my pages pretty.

Just like snowdrops and crocus are harbingers of the spring season, my desire to pretty things up in my planner indicates to me that something is stirring in the frozen wasteland of my psyche! Could a spring thaw be coming?!

While I was playing in my planner, flipping through sheets of stickers with inspirational words, matching washi tape to my weekly to-do list, I felt a little current of happiness flowing through me. A gathering of energy, even a flicker of creativity—things that have been sorely lacking lately.

Even though I’m still essentially going no place that isn’t necessary, I feel the slightest tickle of, could that be…hope? That I will—we will—be able to enjoy life a bit more soon. When I’ll be able to write “coffee with ______” on my pages, when the exhortation of “wake up and be awesome” won’t make me want to hide under the covers (my stickers are ambitious).

Even though my pages are still mostly blank, surely they will begin to fill up soon? Maybe with a visit to an outdoor market before it gets too hot? Maybe even with “plan trip to California”? I need to start penciling in things to look forward to!

It’s such a small thing, this desire to decorate my daily calendar. But I hope it’s the start of something positive.

When you’ve been down, what small thing(s) demonstrate to you that you’re feeling better?

“Time to check in with ourselves, to sit in the core of who we are and uncover what’s really going on in there. If our cells are repaired while we sleep, then our heart is renewed in the quiet of the alone. And it’s there in the stillness that we truly get to know ourselves, learning how to live with genuine curiosity and desire, rather than need and avoidance.”

—Susannah Conway, This I Know

Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash

“If you aren’t good at loving yourself, you will have a difficult time loving anyone, since you’ll resent the time and energy you give another person that you aren’t even giving to yourself.”

—Barbara De Angelis

On Valentine’s Day—and every day—don’t forget to show yourself some love. So often we don't offer ourselves the same forgiveness, kindness, or encouragement that we offer to others. These things are far more important gifts than chocolates or flowers, lovely as those things are.

 Life has been hard lately. We all deserve a little loving kindness.

Thing seven

Recently I’ve seen a proliferation of blog posts titled “Things Saving My Life Right Now” (see below for links to a few, and click here to read blogger and author Modern Mrs. Darcy’s description of the origin of the practice). I think we’re all in need of little life saving—sanity saving at the very least. The past year has been hard, hard, hard. So let’s turn our attention to what’s making us happy and try to forget about the negative stuff for a while.

Back in October, I listed a few of my favorite things and asked for some of yours. Here are the Friday Favorites from the Catching Happiness readers who responded to that post:

• Homemade chicken Parmesan meatballs—Marianne (she gave me the recipe—I can attest to the fact that they are a Happy Little Thing)

• Practicing and teaching yoga—Terry
• Watching the old Andy Griffith show with my husband (“Barney never fails to make us laugh”), and walks with the dogs in the fall weather—Debbie

Saving my life right now:

Health. Never has it been more appreciated. As Happy Little Thoughts subscribers know, my husband is recovering from COVID-19. He had a mild case, and while he still has the stray odd symptom, he’s essentially over it. Our son and I never caught the virus—something we are very thankful for.

Instacart (no affiliation). They delivered our groceries during quarantine, and it made me feel like royalty. “Just leave the bags on the front porch, my good woman” (spoken in a British accent). 

Reading. My reading year has gotten off to a booming start (I guess quarantine isn’t all bad)—I read 12 books in January!  In case I haven’t mentioned it lately, Reading Is My Favorite. One of my recent favorite reads is Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine. I grew to have a real affection for Eleanor. 

The Great Pottery Throw Down. My husband and I finished watching The Great British Baking Show a few weeks (months? who can keep track) ago, and just stumbled onto this show last week. I knew nothing at all about making pottery, but now I’m tossing around terms like slip and raku like I know what I’m talking about. And I’ve gained a huge amount of respect for potters in general.

Broadway musical soundtracks. I so much miss going to the musicals at the Straz Center in Tampa. It’s a poor substitute, but I’ve been listening to soundtracks in my car and while I work in my office. I own a few (Hamilton, Hairspray, Wicked), and am borrowing others from the library (Mean Girls, Into the Woods, Dear Evan Hansen). Singing along is optional but recommended.

Yoga practice. The aforementioned Terry is a yoga teacher with an online yoga membership program. I’ve been practicing with her two times a week most weeks, and my body feels the better for it. I get a lot of “help” when I’m on the mat—both Luna and Prudy are very interested when I sit or lie down on the floor. Luna especially likes to drop her toys on me while I’m down there.

Luna ready for yoga class

Tank. If I hadn’t had the barn and my horse to be with over the past year, I wonder just how crazy I would be by now. Staying away during quarantine was tough. I know most people probably don’t want a horse of their own, but maybe there is some other truly absorbing hobby or pastime you could pursue that would help you forget your worries and responsibilities for a while. It really is life saving…or at least sanity saving.

I think it’s interesting to see all the different things people feel are saving their lives. If you’re nosy like me, here’s a small selection of additional life-saving posts:

The Tiny Domestic Tasks That Are Saving My Life Right Now

Five Things That Are Saving My Life Right Now

7 Things That Are Saving My Life Right Now

What’s Saving My Life Right Now?

Now it’s your turn—what’s saving your life right now?