Like a black cat crossing your path.

Someone recently asked me, “What makes me happy?” A simple question, one I’m sure I’ve been asked before, but for some reason this particular time, I was overwhelmed. It almost felt like I had just ran into a wall in front of a crowd of people; there was immediate surprise with the growing warmth of embarrassment. I wasn’t exactly sure why I felt either emotion, and that only added to the growing feeling of being overwhelmed.

It took me a few minutes to sift through the whirling and buzzing of the surprise and embarrassment; my avid attempt to understand myself in all its confusing glory. Then something (the wall perhaps, its attempt at revenge?) hit me: I’m not entirely conscious of what makes me happy. I mean, I know the feeling when I feel it; that glow that sort of arises from your inner most parts, the extra glimmer in your eye, the added pink to your cheeks. It’s a feeling I’m hungry for, but very rarely seek out. So what, exactly, makes me happy?

The sound of genuine laughter. The special way it radiates off the walls, and adds to the melody that life is playing. A hug. And not just a one handed, 3.5 second hug, but a real hug; the ones where the other person hugs you not just with their arms, but with their body, their neck, the hearts, too. Conversation. The ones that take a hundred different turns, segment off onto a dozen more tangents and hit every emotion one can feel; you laugh, you ponder, you tear up, you feel. Love. All the different kinds of love there are. The friendship love, the family love, the love you feel for new ideas and epiphanies, the love that hits you right where it counts and leaves a heart shaped print on you forever. Learning. The kind of learning that doesn’t come from a text book, or rely on a classroom and professor; the kind that comes from the simple act of living. Honesty. It isn’t important if it’s “positive” or “negative,” all I want is the bare bones truth; no sugar coating or beating around the bush. Acceptance. It’s not enough to tolerate something, or simply acknowledge and put up with it; it’s far more beautiful to embrace life, and allow it to help you grow. Wealth. Not the sort of wealth that you balance in a check book, or gleams expensively in the drive way. I’m talking about the wealth that builds your life; the laughter and love and learning that comes with every breath you take. Life. Every single thing about it makes me happy; all the joys, the tears, the stumbles, the leaps, the wins, the losses.

But when someone asks you, “What makes you happy?” do they really want to hear all that? Or are they simply looking for a clean and neat answer like, “chocolate, foot rubs, good food, dancing”? And I’m not saying those things don’t add to the happiness in my life, because they do. They’re just more like the “salt and pepper” of life; that extra little something that would certainly be missed if it weren’t there, but doesn’t exactly make a meal.