tonic

Do you ever feel that you are having an out-of-body feeling looking back on your life? Did I really do that - both good things and bad?

I think all of us  have dividers in our lives, like putting those plastic sticks on the check-out conveyor belt to denote where your purchase stops and starts. I do that with my life: childhood, schooling, marriage, teaching abroad, grad school, small children, work, teen children, , full-time work, part-time work and eventual retirement..... marker, marker, marker!

When I stop to reflect, I can scarcely recognize the me inside some of those markers! Sometimes I'm proud, chagrined, unbelieving, sad, satisfied.

I'm friends with someone who fights for serenity every day, every minute because depressing battle fatigue tends to take over - like a cardboard cutout that you have to prop from every side with serious weights.

I can't conceive of such a condition.

Despite whatever regrets I may have in looking back, most of the time, in the ongoing moment, I'm content.

If I could bottle that elixir, I'd be a wealthy woman as well as a happy one!