Owning Your Happiness...

Today started out like most others. I was battling some inner issues which threatened my overall happiness, but I felt good, I felt positive, and I was using my energies to overcome other, more dismal, feelings. I was thinking about Maya and how she's really one year old and becoming more of a little girl and less of a baby every day. I was thinking about the soap shop and how, although I'm certain I've made the right decision, how the reality of letting go is tough. But there are always issues, right? There are always feelings that we're putting aside to live our life to the fullest. In this sense, we chose to create our own happiness. So I was choosing happiness in spite of my feelings, even putting in my contacts and wearing a skirt and some makeup.

Anyway, we had a busy morning. Maya had an early Dr.'s appt. and Rayne wanted to be driven to school which meant that I had to eat breakfast and feed and clothe all the girls before 8:15am...not impossible, but a bit more of a challenge than our usual mornings. I was leaving the house a bit late, knowing that I had to get Rayne to school and then to the Dr. and I had no time to lose. I was cruising along the back country roads to Rayne's school, probably a bit faster than I should have been...but there is very little traffic on those roads. As I slowed, then glided through a stop sign, my stomach turned inside out to see a police car pulling up to the same intersection on my right. Ouch. I knew he totally had me if he wanted me. I drove the exact speed limit for nearly two miles, thinking that out of the goodness of his heart, he let the whole stop sign thing slide. But then the lights came on. Apparently, my registration had expired. In June. Of last year. BIG OUCH!

You see, having never in my whole life gotten any sort of traffic citation, I received my very first about six months ago...excessive speed, I believe was the term. It got me a few points on my driver's license at which point I was informed that more points would result in the loss of my license. So, the whole 25 minutes that I'm sitting there, with my three kids in the car, giving up hope of making it anywhere on time, wondering how in the world I could have been so irresponsible to have let my registration expire, and waiting for the trooper to determine my fate, I kept thinking "oh my goodness, how am I going to take care of my kids and do what I need to do without a license? How will Rayne get home  from the bus stop? How will I get groceries? How will I get away when I feel like I'm going crazy?"

Out of the goodness of this man's heart, he came back with a slightly costly citation for the expired registration and a "verbal warning" for the stop sign...no points. I thanked him, knowing he had done me an enormous favor and most likely knew it. I drove away feeling horrible. Feeling stupid, and careless, and irresponsible. I felt crushed and deflated. I felt so small and silly, with my skirt and my makeup.

Later, once I had gotten home, I realized that I had allowed the registration to expire on our current car while renewing it on a car that we had sold. So the registration ordeal turned out to be a simple mistake, rather than an irresponsible oversight. And I tried to feel better about things...but I didn't. And then I found this, and then this, and it occurred to me that for as much as I fought my own inner demons to choose and create my own happiness, I had offered it up without a fight to the first something or other that threatened to take it. I neglected to recall all the bills I do pay on time, all the great things I do for my kids {like driving Rayne to school when she doesn't feel like riding the bus}, all the deadlines I meet and responsibilities I tackle, all my accomplishments. I gave myself no credit for all the good I am and all the good I do because of one small mistake.

So, I did what any artist would do...I decided right there and then to turn that blemish into a beauty mark...I took that citation and photographed it as I would any treasure. I started forming this post in my head thinking of all the ways and moments and instances where I've given up my happiness so easily, even though I had fought so hard to get it. And in that moment, I felt what it means to own my happiness. And by photographing that citation, I took away it's power to steal my happiness. Because my happiness is mine and mine alone...and it's going to take something much, MUCH bigger to get me to give it up!