Simple

We had 12 days of simple.  No television, no phones, no newspapers.  We ate simple meals and enjoyed the simple quiet.

I love simple.  I want more of it in my everyday life!

We are truly on our way to achieving that.  We got rid of our land line, and discontinued our satellite TV service.  I'm not getting rid of the internet service, though, because then I couldn't visit my favorite blogs!  Oh, yeah, I couldn't blog either without it.  That was an afterthought.

So I cut down to only sugar in my coffee.  Trying to cook more one-pan meals with fewer ingredients because I often work late.  I'm paring down my makeup routine and I picked a simpler hairstyle.  The hardest thing of all?  I'm trying to cut back on multi-tasking!  I might be addicted to multi-tasking.  I don't know if I can quit cold-turkey.

I usually have so many windows open on my computer that there seems to be a breeze coming out of the monitor screen.  My job does require an ability to multi-task, but maybe not an addiction to it?  At home, I read, watch a movie and polish my nails all at the same time.  This is all very good and well until I notice myself not finishing anything, or not giving any one thing my full attention.  That's how you wind up eating the entire bag of potato chips or the whole carton of cookie dough ice cream....by not paying attention.

Tonight is going to be simple.  I'm going to roast some fresh garden green chilies while I barbecue chicken for dinner and sip a little sweet wine.  Then a green salad and chicken for a quiet dinner on the patio.  A little music and some good conversation.  They are the simplest of pleasures, and therefore the most pleasing of all.

How often do you hear someone speak with a wistful sigh of cramming for their college exams?  No, when we look back, we remember eating watermelon on the front step in the summertime, or playing tag in the dark when it was the most fun of all.  We remember sitting in Grandma's lap, or the family gathered around the dinner table.  The simplest of pleasures.

When we look back at our own children as babies, we don't think about the paperwork for insurance, or getting them vaccinated.  We remember how it felt to hold them in our arms and how much it meant to be the only ones who could comfort them when they cried.  The simplest of pleasures.

And then the day comes (hopefully) when all we want to do is sit in the warm sun, with a little yappy dog in our laps, and watch our great-grandchildren sitting on the front step, eating watermelon.