Happiness

So many people have so many conflicting ideas about what this is. I'm musing, laying here on the couch, watching the clouds go by as I edit my photos, wondering what to make of something like happiness. What I know is that for me at least it has never been a constant state. Some people seem very "happy" people - not me. For me it's a fleeting thing, happy "bursts", although I've striven to reach a "happy" state. I've felt quite guilty about that this year - since I got married in January there's been, I think, a mutual expectation of a certain higher average level of daily happiness. Yet again that hasn't been the case and I don't think any more that it's circumstantial. 2006 has been a very hard year for me.

Instead it feels like the nature of happiness has changed. With age it feels more like something which can exist, but with strings. The older I get the more compromises enter my life, the more restrictions appear, the more harsh lessons get learned. Happiness can't be this constant, blissful state under such conditions. I know that's something I tried for a few years ago, but reality proved it to be an illusion and a false target. Now, even though I regularly don't consciously feel "happy", bombarded by the transitory and constant pressures life brings, I'm aware that happiness, an adult happiness, might be there anyway. I just have to acknowledge it.