Counting my blessings
Someone wise once remarked that writing about sadness is easy because the heart naturally seeks to vent, but only an accomplished writer has what it takes to express happiness in words.
This thought returned while I was crafting this column last week. I wanted to muse over the suicide of Iris Chang, the author of The Rape of Nanking, until I realised that my colleague Philip Lee had already dealt with the subject.
Chang's death prompted me to examine my own emotions. I quickly came to the realisation that I tend to wallow in melancholy and focus on the dark side of life. I prefer moping to hoping, complaining to celebrating.
But what better time to count our blessings than in December.
I was dreading this month because it marks Streats' last days, forgetting that an end also heralds a fresh begining and that Christmas is in season.
To remind myself, I started listing little everyday things that give me a high, make me smile and remind me to be grateful to be alive.
Let me share my list. Perhaps readers might want to start their own:
- Finding out that the 4-D number I forgot to buy did not strike.
- Waking up from a nightmare.
- Waking up and realising that I still have an hour left to sleep.
- Dancing.
- Eating four Kenny Rogers corn muffins and finding I can still fit into a pair of skin-tight Levi's jeans.
- Receiving an sms from a guy after my break up telling me that he honestly thought, from the begining, that I am too sexy for my ex.
- Rain during the weekend because it is the perfect music for snuggling in bed with a cup of coffee and a book that feeds my soul.
- Sunshine after the rain.
- Having a large group of friends reaching an agreement on which restaurant to go to.
- Friends who call just to say: "how do you do?"
- Being alone and hearing my favourite song on the car radio so that I can shimmy my shoulders and sing along loudly.
- Receiving a $4,000 cheque from my insurance company as bonus for an endowment policy I had forgotten all about.
- Seeing the expression on my colleague's face each time I fill her vase with flowers.
- The hit counter of my website www.janice-wong.com soaring.
- Reading my horoscope online and finding out that Mars is in Scorpio, so my social life is going to sparkle this month.
- Smooth traffic and finding a parking lot at Holland Village, Suntec City or Raffles City on Saturdays.
- Knowing that I have done the right thing, no matter what other people think.
- Someone reading my column -- Thank You.
This thought returned while I was crafting this column last week. I wanted to muse over the suicide of Iris Chang, the author of The Rape of Nanking, until I realised that my colleague Philip Lee had already dealt with the subject.
Chang's death prompted me to examine my own emotions. I quickly came to the realisation that I tend to wallow in melancholy and focus on the dark side of life. I prefer moping to hoping, complaining to celebrating.
But what better time to count our blessings than in December.
I was dreading this month because it marks Streats' last days, forgetting that an end also heralds a fresh begining and that Christmas is in season.
To remind myself, I started listing little everyday things that give me a high, make me smile and remind me to be grateful to be alive.
Let me share my list. Perhaps readers might want to start their own:
- Finding out that the 4-D number I forgot to buy did not strike.
- Waking up from a nightmare.
- Waking up and realising that I still have an hour left to sleep.
- Dancing.
- Eating four Kenny Rogers corn muffins and finding I can still fit into a pair of skin-tight Levi's jeans.
- Receiving an sms from a guy after my break up telling me that he honestly thought, from the begining, that I am too sexy for my ex.
- Rain during the weekend because it is the perfect music for snuggling in bed with a cup of coffee and a book that feeds my soul.
- Sunshine after the rain.
- Having a large group of friends reaching an agreement on which restaurant to go to.
- Friends who call just to say: "how do you do?"
- Being alone and hearing my favourite song on the car radio so that I can shimmy my shoulders and sing along loudly.
- Receiving a $4,000 cheque from my insurance company as bonus for an endowment policy I had forgotten all about.
- Seeing the expression on my colleague's face each time I fill her vase with flowers.
- The hit counter of my website www.janice-wong.com soaring.
- Reading my horoscope online and finding out that Mars is in Scorpio, so my social life is going to sparkle this month.
- Smooth traffic and finding a parking lot at Holland Village, Suntec City or Raffles City on Saturdays.
- Knowing that I have done the right thing, no matter what other people think.
- Someone reading my column -- Thank You.
Dec 7, 2006
Streats
Hope you like this little article from Janice Wong's book - SPG: Single Picky Girl. Maybe we should all write this little list once in a while to remind ourselves that life's not that bad after all.
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