Ate my breakfast, toast with cherry jam and bacon, perched in the swing this morning, my hot coffee resting in a cup a holder fastened on the red swing slats. The sky is overcast with dark gray clouds hiding the blue sky canvas. Two squirrels are playing chase around the trunk of a large oak tree down the street. I can see them running in circles around the trunk, up and down, scolding each other. The breeze is cool this morning, urging fall along, blowing the tops of the street’s tall water oaks and large statuesque magnolia trees. The wind chimes are softly pinging a simple one pipe yard symphony. All is well on my little porch in paradise.

I have the most beautiful male cardinal in my yard today. He is just fluorescent red, the color of that beautiful flaming sun I watched set yesterday. I’ve never seen a cardinal with such vivid feathers. Maybe it’s Chief stopping in to visit. We watched each other intently when he sat on the bird feeder closest to the porch. A cardinal is thought to be a go between for heaven and earth, carrying messages from our deceased loved ones. I got your message today, Chief! Hope you got mine!

The hummingbirds are really at war this morning. I can hear their beaks strike together during their sword fights and a little thump when they chest bump each other. They fight more than they take time to feed. A little fat one stays on guard, running them all off, but doesn’t visit the feeders, just keeps everyone else away. Makes me think of that saying, “Why can’t we all just get along and be friends.”

I just looked up to see what a squirrel was fussing at and saw a fat rat sitting on one of the bird feeders! Seriously, my yard is a critter magnet. Chunked a rock at the rat so maybe he’ll not come back. Got to get a BB gun to pop him. A little spray of cinnamon and clove oil on the pole and bottom of the bird feeder and he won’t visit that feeder again. Balthazar, my resident king snake, got a squirt of the cinnamon and cloves when he got in my kitchen window and he hasn’t been seen since!

Missed the sunset tonight. I was picking up my Wally World grocery order. Had to substitute my two slices of Mrs. Edwards key lime pie for a whole key lime pie. I didn’t mind a bit. Agreed to that substitution real quick!

I noticed the beautiful layer of pale peach sky on the horizon as I drove home. Painted on top of the peach hue were brush strokes of blue and purple and dark gray. So pretty in their layers. I’m sure Father Sky kissed the sun good night as she lay her head down under the beautiful sunset. She’s a lucky girl to go to sleep under such a majestic sky painting.

Read a quote about gratitude today and read several different definitions of the word gratitude. Webster’s defines gratitude as the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. I’ve decided the key to happiness is gratitude and acceptance.

Gratitude gives us time to reflect on how lucky we are when good things happen in our lives. I think being grateful for the small things — the ordinary day when our cars crank, our work day goes well, we enjoy supper that night — should help us cope with days when things don’t go well. We take so many things for granted, our homes, family, friends, clean water, food on our tables, healthy children, just to name a few. We even take waking up with breath for another day for granted.

I live in a home that’s 103 years old. Needs some work but I’m grateful to have this home and I’m happy with life here. I can wish for new windows and central air and heat and brick bannisters that don’t need a few bricks and mortar. I could make myself miserable wishing for improvements that right now aren’t financially feasible. But the joy I get from the memories of countless weekends spent here with Chief, the memories of our wedding here before the living room fire place, memories of four generations of holiday traditions, and my glorious days of porch pondering and bird watching, fill my heart with gratitude and make this old house, to me, a mansion in all her glory.

We don’t appreciate the ordinary days, and I’m guilty too, we just complain when they don’t go our way. Gratitude helps turn a house into a home, an every day meal into a feast, the ordinary into the extraordinary. If we could just be satisfied with what we have and not keep searching for something that’s unobtainable. Choose to be grateful. Happiness is within your reach. Gratitude is the key.

“I am happy because I’m grateful. I choose to be grateful. That gratitude allows me to be happy,” — Will Arnett