Happy places

  I’m no world traveler, but I’ve seen the savannah.  It’s there that I saw lion cub siblings make their way across a river bed.

In Kenya I also linked hands and sang and danced and laughed with a host of beautiful orphans, more like angels.

My happy experiences are too many to count, like Granny’s sugar and butter bread or trips in the camper with Meme, Grandad and the cousins.

Who could forget twirling about in the living room as a child to the Alvin and the Chipmunks Christmas record in the light of the Christmas tree with presents underneath bearing my name?

Thirty weeks of summers I’ve spent nestled in the Colorado mountains with campfires, smores and family.

Happy places

New Years Eve on my thirtieth birthday was spent right smack dab in the middle of New York City-snow ,  FAO Schwartz, Broadway, bright city lights and all.

With my family, I’ve watched in sheer delight as Tinkerbell took flight from the tip of the Magic Kingdom castle.

Boat time, birthdays and baptisms

 

Memories of happy places

I’ve stood before friends and family in the perfect dress saying “I do”; a most assured statement I still make.

Three times I’ve been handed a tiny bundle of joy; each time astounded that something so small can weigh so heavy.

They’re still my happy places.

Happy places CAN be created.

 Still there’s a happy place that can’t be sought out using latitude and longitude degrees or GPS.  It can’t be found, in once or thrice in a lifetime events.

 JOY

It bubbles outward through hard hugs and songs sung in the car.  Joy expresses itself through pizza parties and awe-inspiring sunrises in Kenya and your backyard.  It’s shows itself through pictures on refrigerators and high fives.

But its origin is from within

   JOY is anchored in our soul, unmoved by rippling circumstances.  It’s not carried away or made dim by the passing of time or the setting of the sun. Joy is the best happy place.  It is delight, yes in those things that can be captured with a lens and a flash, but it lives in our deepest part.  Through failures and losses, loneliness and faded memories, joy stays.  Created and manifested by the eternal one, joy is indestructible and unlimited.  It’s yours and mine to have and to share

Joy is in Jesus  

 Jesus is Joy

What are some of your happy places?