Le bonheur

From time to time in the last several months, I find myself suddenly overcome with a feeling of "le bonheur" or "happiness."  I can't really explain it and I especially can't ever explain the timing of these feelings. I might be walking around the block, which actually is an understandable venue.  But it happens just as often when I'm sitting in front of the t.v. watching the news--the bulk of which is stressful, anxiety producing, makes me angry or at least annoyed, fills me with sorrow, and rarely makes me feel good.  And sometimes I'm stuck in traffic watching the light turn red and green and red and green while I sit with my foot on the brake.  Or in a more understandable moment, I'm at the table with my boys enjoying a meal.  It simply strikes uninvited, but most welcome, at the strangest times.

I wonder if I am undergoing some kind of metamorphosis--some physical change in the structure of my brain.  Or is it that I've reached a point in my life when I can compartmentalize any frustration or sadness in a way that shuts it down before it can grab my soul.  I'm not fighting it.  I'm enjoying it.  But I cannot really understand it.  And I don't remember ever having this kind of intense and sudden feeling out of the blue.

I still ponder morbid thoughts about the endless possibilities that could befall me--especially just as we're ready to leave for France in the fall.  But these newfound deep feelings of elation and happiness are a welcome respite.  I'm counting on them to comfort me through the drudgery of the already-proving-to-be rancorous presidential campaign, the despair reported about people's lives on the news, the ever-worsening climate change, concern for the ubiquitous terrorist violence, ad infinitum.

I chose "le bonheur" as my companion any time it drifts my way.