One day, a couple of years ago, I was driving along with my niece, Ella. She was seven, maybe eight, and Maroon 5's Payphone was on the radio, both of us singing along like goofballs. The song got to the chorus:
If "Happy Ever After" did exist,
I would still be holding you like this
All those fairy tales are full of it.
One more stupid love song, I'll be sick
I would still be holding you like this
All those fairy tales are full of it.
One more stupid love song, I'll be sick
Immediately after that, Ella stared off dreamily and said, "Isn't that the most romantic line? 'If happy ever after did exist' ?"
I looked at her, and only half joking, I said, "You know, that happened to me. I lived happily ever after."
Ella's eyes got huge and she asked, "When?"
"Right now," I laughed. "I met and married Uncle Dave twenty-something years ago and I lived happily ever after."
With a scowl she responded the way she always does when she thinks she's being teased: "Auntie Kriiiista!"
But like I said, I was only half joking -- no one would look at my life and doubt that I lived happily ever after, it's just hard to stop and evaluate a life while it's still happening; I guess I have yet to reach the ever in ever after. I saw that quote above the other day and thought that's it, that's my New Year's resolution (not that I ever worry about New Year's resolutions). I do want "to make God belly laugh, glad that he gave life to someone who enjoys the gift". I want to be more grateful for the little things that make up this lovely existence; knowing that it's fleeting; knowing that I have lived in a charmed time and place, free of war and famine and disease; free too, so far, of personal hardship or tragedy or more than the average person's share of unhappiness. I want to not only eat cold tangerines but to be mindful, as the juice runs down my chin, that this is my life; that the minutiae isn't just filler until something happens; somethings are happening all the time and a great deal of it is within my control.
Happy ever after does exist, and I'm living it. This life already sizzles and pops.
