Tag Archives: driving

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Take the step 

The more I walk on this path the more I believe that what I think about is what I attract. It’s a big part of why I have my daily happiness moments – to make sure that at least one time a day I’m actively seeking and attracting happiness into my life. 

Last night as I was falling asleep I was thinking of time I spent as a youth in Southern Alberta. My parents had bought me a pony from one of the ranches south west of Longview (Pirate, my best friend through my teen years and well into adulthood). A bonus of this purchase was some time spent over a couple of  summers at their ranch taking lessons and hanging out. It is one of the most beautiful places I’ve been to. Very similar to home and yet more rural and therefore a bit different. 

This morning I had a call from my cousin asking if I could pick up her daughter and a friend at their camp. Camp was about 45 minutes south of the same ranch I had fallen asleep thinking about. The law of attraction. 

Jenna and I enjoyed a beautiful backroads drive along the Rocky Mountains. It was a stunning day, and enjoying her company while enjoying the beauty of our mountains was indeed a happiness moment. 

  

Here we are up on the top of the mountain. You can see the road we had to travel off on the side. No safety net with this one – just a big drop off the side. 
  

We had to drive pretty much straight down this mountain. It’s a very narrow gravel road and there are no guard rails. I was more than a little anxious driving up the mountain – and we were on the side with the hill in that direction. I had no idea how I was going to get us back down. I am not a big fan of heights, and although my anxiety has calmed down incredibly- there is still the underlying fear that a panic arrack could rear it’s ugly head. 

I contemplated my choices – which were not many – and then bravely started driving down. Breathe deeply, breathe slowly, think with confidence, have faith that I can accomplish this task and that I am doing the right thing. 

Pretty much the same mantra I’ve been carrying for the past few months. It worked for me both in daily life and also to get down the mountain. Take the step, have faith that the next step will be there. 

Is this not seriously the most beautiful place that I am so fortunate as to call home?

The view from the top of the road. I kept my faith and the road rose up to meet me. 

 

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My Happiness Project

Yesterday I had the rare occasion of driving alone. I used to love driving alone – music up, hair blowing, no yapping voices… now I cry when I drive alone. I started my cry/driving after we moved back home and Dad was so sick. I would take the kids into school and then cry/drive all the way home. Then cry/drive back to school to get them. I thought I was over it, but it seems as though the reality is simply that I haven’t had a moment in the car by myself.

I cry/drove most of the way home last evening. Thinking about Dad, about how completely unfair it seems that we finally move back and now he’s gone. About how guilty I feel that we lost all those years. So, I drove and I cried.

Then I came over Edge’s hill. As soon as I come over their hill I see home. The ranch, the barn, the homes – the places where my little footprints have been pitter pattering since the beginning of my time. I felt a rush of happiness – of joy. I realized then that even with all my sorrow and grief I am happy.

That may not sound like the huge freaking deal that it is – but I’ve spent years being unhappy, being scared and being anxious. And now I’m HAPPY. I’m sad about Dad, I’m nervous for the future – but I’M HAPPY and that is a huge gift.

Jenna and I went to Banff today for Fondue at the Grizzly House. Cheese Fondue followed by Fruit with Toblerone Chocolate Fondue. If you want to know what happiness tastes like, it tastes a lot like this: 

In our family tradition (started by my Dad) of not drinking from the bowl, Jenna finished off the last of the chocolate fondue in style:

Happiness also looks like this:  This however, is what Anger looks like. We have had two gifts this summer. One was the movie Inside Out, and the other one is that there are hardly any mosquitos (again, sounds like not a big deal but huge deal).

Inside out has given us the platform to feel out our emotions.

Jenna and I were heading out of Banff, Abba blasting out of the car stereo (this seems to be our road trip music), when I heard Let go of my anger!!! Grrrrrrrrrr!!!

Not sure what she was talking about, I looked beside me to see her trying to rip Anger out of his packaging. Apparently Anger makes her Angry. Even better, Anger only was purchased because Joy was sold out and that made her Angry.

We talked about different emotion balls and how one emotion can affect another.

A day with my girl. My happiness moment. Remembering that I am happy and that it’s ok to let go of my fears and anxiety will have a huge impact on how I live the rest of my life.

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The sound of silence. 

Today has been a feel gross day. I’m not sure if I’m sick or if I am just feeling like emotional crap. Either way, the result is the same. Blah. Actually, I’m hoping it’s the result of some emotional junk moving through me from my energy work and my yoga. I’ve started a new session of Healing Light Yoga Therapy, which is restorative yoga and is the most wonderful thing for my soul. But it often gives me some yuck along the way. 

So, I’m dealing with the aftermath of my phone in the toilet. If bad things come in threes, I had it last night with the skunk, the phone, and the barfing kid. I have a good warrantee though and for a couple of hundred dollars, by tomorrow or Wednesday I’ll have a new one. But, for now I live in silence. 

I have discovered that the level of silence I can tolerate is directly related to my level of anxiety. The higher the anxiety the less I can handle total silence.  No noise means having to listen to the small voices that are telling me I’m stuck in a bad place. Since moving home, my anxiety is so much less I barely even think about it. But, I discovered today that I’ve still been filling more silence gaps than I realized. I’ve been doing this by either messing around on the Internet or using music to fill the quiet. 

On the way into town this morning,  Jacob and I were half way in before we realized the car radio was off. When we did, we both commented on how nice it was to enjoy the quiet, appreciate the scenery, and relax into the silence. The sound of silence is a beautiful thing. It’s also where all my big thoughts happen and my profound emotions come from. My moment of happiness today was that drive into town with Jacob. 

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Reacting to karma 

The other day I read a quote that went something like how people treat you is their karma, how you react is yours. It’s been floating around in my brain ever since, but I had the opportunity to put the quote into practice today. 

I was driving to pick the kids up after school. Late as usual, driving on the gravel road. The speed limit is 80km/hr and I was doing it. I came around a corner and someone (whom I gave some choice words to in my head) pulled out of a drive about 5 feet in front of me and were doing maybe 15km/hr. They hadn’t stopped before coming onto the road and if they saw me they didn’t care. Slamming on the brakes on a gravel road can be tricky and I floated across the rocks for a little bit muttering some choice words. 

There is a chance they didn’t see me, but the more likely option is that they did and they didn’t want to get behind me on the gravel (the dust). They kept themselves at a very slow 50 km/hr while I was stuck behind them. 

At first I was mad. There are too many ignorant drivers, and I do seem to attract them. But then I went back to the quote that had been floating around in my head. How they were acting was their karma. They had to look themselves in the mirror at the end of the day and be right with how they had behaved today. How I was reacting was my karma. It wasn’t making me a better person muttering fickity flick flick and shooting them looks of death from my driver’s seat. 

I need to remember that I always get to choose how I act and how I react. No matter how other people treat me. How they behave is their issue, and I can only control my own behavior.

Still not happy at being cut off, I was happy to have had the opportunity to think that quote into practice. It made me change my reaction and change my behavior. 

 It was a beautiful sunshine day. My happiness moment was my morning walk with my Dotted Dog. I was thinking while walking about how in Roanoke I started my happiness moments and had to look really hard each day to find one. As I was walking and letting my brain run, I noticed that my thoughts were full of things like its so beautiful here, I am so happy to be home, I love it here. Happiness. 

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When life gives you lemons…. Eat lemon cake 

Today was a day that in many ways felt like life really had handed me lemons. This afternoon while  I was at the grocery store thinking about my lemon day, I looked down and there was this lemon cake. I figured what the heck, when life hands me lemons darn it I’m going to eat lemon cake. It was delicious by the way. 

   

I have sometimes wondered how my exit from this world will be. I hope at the very least it’s somewhat dignified. It probably won’t be. But one can hope. 

Today when I was driving my kids home from school I had a little preview of what that could be like. Trust me it was not dignified at all.

We were driving on the highway following some other cars when suddenly a very large gravel truck with an extra trailer pulled out from a side road and started making a left hand turn across the two lane highway and in front of us   

I was doing 100 km/hour and suddenly there was a monster of a truck just a few feet away from us and moving in our direction. I hit the brakes and the horn as we skidded/flew across our lane and onto the shoulder I screamed FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUU – well you know the rest – as loudly as I could. Either the horn or my swearing caught the attention of the truck driver and he stopped – blocking all oncoming traffic. Thank goodness no one was coming right at the moment. We were somewhere between 2-4 feet from the front of the truck when he stopped. 

So while my motto has always kind of been this:

 
Apparently it’s more likely that I will slide in screaming the F bomb. My poor children.  

I took away several things from this moment. 

1. My guardian angel works hard and probably falls into bed exhausted at night. 

2. My life has been saved several times by my being behind the wheel of a Volvo. 

3. I should always take backroads. 

4. Sometimes when life seems to be all lemony it’s not really so much so. That living in the moment thing. Sometimes the moments are good and sometimes they’re not so good. But they are moments and there is something to be gained from each one of them.  

My happiness moment today was that I got to spend most of the day with my parents and my sister. While it was a day that seemed to want to hand us lemons we did our best to make lemon cake. In fact we ate that lemon cake together tonight before my sister headed back home. 

Happiness is those small moments with the people you love. 

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The daily commute 

It’s a double post today. This is the one I had planned before the after school incident took place. 

I was thinking today how awesomely lucky we are with our daily commute to school. This is the traffic jam I was in on my way to pick up the kids:   

And this is the view on the way home: 

    

It was so awesome that Jenna had to get out and do her holding the world in her hands picture 

 

Happiness drive. Happiness moment 

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No test zone

Two happiness moments for the day

My dad is home from the hospital. So wonderful to have him back where he belongs. Home is more complete now. 

Went into AMA to see what I needed to do to switch my licence from Virginia to Alberta. When we moved to the states I had to take both the written and driving test. Nightmare. I’ve need driving legally for 30 years. I was terrified at the thought of having to do that yet again. Well, I don’t have to do the test again. Just fill out some paperwork. Happy and relieved. 

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Drive a fast car

When I was a kid I remember being packed in the Suburban with cousins flying up and down back roads at breakneck speeds. Once in a while we would find that magic road that had the right bumps in it that made me feel like I was losing my stomach when we would drive over it.  Of course once we found that magic road we had to drive back up and down it a few times squealing with delight the entire way. 

Today I had my kids and my cousin’s kids (the same cousin who used to do the driving on those magic roads) in my car and we were driving to drop off some recycling. As we drove past another relative’s driveway I told the kids of the magic road and how their mom/aunt had driven us up and down that road one afternoon while we giggled. 

But I didn’t turn on that road, I kept driving. I got to where the gravel road meets the highway and drove under the overpass. As I did all four kids squealed and Jacob yelled I think my bladder just fell out a couple of seconds later it happened again. A magic road. We dropped off the recycling and flew over the bumps on the way back. When I got to the turn into the back road all four kids started yelling for me to do it again. So around we turned and flew back up and down the magic road.  

Magic times. My happiness moment for the day. 

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An active participant in fun

Today I played the role of “good mommy” and let Jacob ride shotgun in the suburban  rented for the weekend. It’s black and mafia cool looking, but we have managed to turn it into a crazy family car nonetheless. Here’s what I discovered today – being in the back seat is much more fun than being in the front seat. For example, I could reach through the seat and the head rest and tickle the back of Jacob’s neck. I could reach around the side and poke him. Then when he got angry and tried to squish me to death by backing the front seat right down on me I could swing my legs to the side, grab his seatbelt pinning him to the seat and wet willy him until he cried uncle.

Jenna and I laughed so hard in the back seat we thought we were going to be sick.

We played push your seat back and then flop it forward. We harassed poor Jacob stuck in the front. We played the “are we there yet? I’m bored” game until their dad got that cranky line that says shhhh I’m trying to focus on the road across his forehead. Then we laughed about that.

We took crazy car selfies.

 

Being an active participant in fun is so much better than being a passive participant. It’s so much more heart warming to be able to be a part of the fun than to just watch and enjoy the fun. It does not mean you actively have to get up and do something. In fact when I’m laughing so hard I can’t get up and do anything. It just means being engaged and involved in the fun.

It was by far the happiness moment of the day. I felt lighter for hours after it.

Happiness rocks.

I had my 5th Healing Light Yoga Therapy class today. It was so powerful I don’t even know where to begin. I need some time to process it. But I can guarantee that it’s what set me up for the belly laughing, gut aching fun I had later on.

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