Eating my bagel and fruit on the porch of the cabin in Blue Ridge. The sun rose outside my porch door this morning turning the clouds beautiful shades of pink and orange. Have heard roosters crowing, pileated woodpeckers calling their mates, crows and blue jays cawing in the distance, and I’ve seen buzzards circling over the Toccoa River, but I haven’t seen any small song birds. I know they are around ‘cause I hear them serenading me.

We’ve seen a turkey and some deer crossing the road, their tiny fawns following along dressed in their newborn spotted coats. Haven’t seen any snakes but we’ve been up and down Snake Nation Road and Snake Mountain Road several times. Kinda glad that’s not our address.

We wandered around the downtown of Blue Ridge all morning. The grandchildren took me to the wild bird seed store. I loved it. The store had gourds and purple martin bird houses outside just over flowing of martins. They were fascinating to watch, noisily flying around. I have never seen a female martin till today. I bought a cardinal wind chime to remember my visit. It’ll bring some new notes to the wind-chime symphonies. We had icees and ice cream and wandered around in Hucks General Store enjoying the old country store memorabilia items. I wanted to fill a little tin bucket with candy from the barrels but I bought a little bag of gold nugget bubble gum and some chocolate coins, instead. I loved them as a child.

I bought each of my grandchildren and myself a little glass bluebird of happiness today and told them to put the little birds on their dressers and when they looked at them to remember all the fun and laughter we experienced together on this trip.

As I grow older the simple things in life seem to be more important to me. Every day ordinary experiences bring joy to my life. A good hot cup of coffee with creamer, the melodies of a wind chime, a beautiful sunset, a cherry icee, song birds around the feeders, the happy laughs of precious grandchildren, spending time with my sons and daughter-in-law, a fruit jar of sweet tea, a letter in the mailbox. I don’t think we appreciate all the small moments in life as we should. A single day filled with life’s simple pleasures, that we commonly take for granted, can bring us so much happiness.

“Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude,” — Denis Waitley