Find Someone to Pat Your Back for You!

           

                      

Why is it that the days that fill one with a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction generally sound as dull as dishwater.  Take today, for example.  Right now, I have the feeling that it was a most successful day, and I am looking forward to sitting down with a book with the feeling that I've earned that period of relaxation.  But when - or if - you read the list of my accomplishments, you'll probably snort and think, "Do get over yourself, Noel.  Now you should see what I did today!"  And you'll quite likely be right.  But does that diminish the glow of self-satisfaction and self-righteousness I feel?  Not one whit.

So here's a list of my day.

1. Get up before 7:30 A.M. (hey, I didn't get to sleep until well after 3:00 A.M.!) 
2. Drive D. to doctor's appointment.
3. Drive D. to the mall to catch a bus.
4. Visit ATM.
5. Visit a second bank.
6. Grocery shop
7. Unload and put away said groceries.
8. Weed white flower garden, dig up and throw away red rose (the hybrid white rose was grafted on red rose root stock having little to recommend itself), tied up lilies - again - dispose of garden garbage.
9. Take shower (surely you don't think I did #8 with clean clothes and/or body, did you?  In this morning's heat?)
10. Do some research on the computer.
11. Make and eat lunch while going through a bag full (and I mean full) of magazine pages collected over two years with an eye towards discarding as much as possible.
12. Leave to pick up D at 3:00, but . . .
13. Stop at library to return overdue magazine (don't seem to be able to remember that magazines lend for only 2 weeks instead of a book's 4 weeks) and have a serious conversation with Assistant Director over the importance of our free libraries (sure we pay a nominal amount per year in taxes, but what we get for that amount is HUGE! but don't get me started)
14. Pick up D and drive home to
15. Make garbanzo bean salad for dinner and
16. Square up some blocks.
17. Have dinner
18. Clean up after meal
19. Start writing blog entry.

That's my day, and looking at it, I can see that I did not solve any world crisis, bring joy to the hearts of shut-ins, or help pack food to send to the hungry.  However, it was a day filled with taking care of those little things, the minutiae of daily life, that if not done make us all cranky and snarly with each other.

So, yes, I do feel good, and the next time you have a day like this and smack yourself for not doing something "majorly important", STOP IT!  Instead, savor the feeling of making the highway of your life smoother - for everyone traveling with you.

                          

Back-pats all around - preferably from another human!