Saturday, September 17, 2011

Happiness to Me...

During my morning Facebook reading I noticed how a lot of my old friends from HS have become big party people.

Every Saturday morning it's the same post, "Had a blast last night getting wasted and urinating in public."  

For some reason when I read these I feel really sad for them.  I mean, obviously they're happy with their life.  But what are they really happy about?

For me, their posts start to blend into each other.  They're all about the same thing.  I have a strong feeling, just like their posts, that their life is just a blend of the same night, over and over.

Isn't it funny how not many of those entire nights stand out for these people, but tiny, almost seemingly insignificant moments are burned into the mind of parents.

"Summer just went poop in the potty all by herself today!  For the first time!"

"McKay just ate his first Oreo cookie!"

"Tristin just got his green belt in Karate!  I'm so proud of him!"
These are tiny moments in these parents lives, and yet they'll be with them forever.  The moment, the feeling, the excitement.  I know, I have thousands of those moments stored up in my own mind.

I don't remember much about my late nights out as a teenager (except for the ones with Brett).  They're all pretty much the same.  Fun, but utterly pointless.  Something to fill the time until I would finally be old enough to do whatever I wanted.

Turns out what I wanted was a family.  And substantial memories.  Microscopic happy moments my heart feels strong enough to hold onto forever.

I guess, for me, happiness is found in living my life for someone else, not for myself. 

I wish I could explain this to those friends out partying every night, putting off family life, putting off life in general.  There's so much happiness to be had.  And shockingly, that happiness isn't found at the bottom of a beer bottle.  It's found in a poopy diaper, apparently.  

Speaking of which, I'll talk to you all later.  

1 comment:

genderist said...

Every once and a while The Hater and I will look at each other and say, "What did we do before we had Baby?" You're right - it all seems so insignificant now that we have a family.

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