Tag: happiness

  • August 12, 2020

    August 12, 2020

    Encountering this quote from Don Quixote (in the form of an epigraph to Niall Williams novel This is Happiness) was a balm to my spirit. Maybe it will act as a balm to yours, too. “All these squalls to which we have been subjected are signs that the weather will soon improve and things will…

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  • February 12, 2019

    February 12, 2019

    From a reader named Tom: “I just read your book, Eugenia Lincoln and the Unexpected Package . . . Eugenia found out how to play the accordion. I liked how her hands trembled when she played the notes. I like how the accordion made Eugenia’s grumpiness turn into happiness.” Dear Tom, Your letter made my…

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  • November 9, 2017

    November 9, 2017

    So, I am deep in the rabbit hole of rewriting a novel. Each morning, I get up and go down to the computer and rewrite. And rewrite, and rewrite. I rewrite for most of the day, a few pages at a time. There are problems that need to be fixed and I don’t know how…

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  • May 5, 2015

    May 5, 2015

    Sometimes, for no reason at all, a feeling of hopelessness will settle down on top of me. I used to call this feeling “low-grade existential despair.” A friend of my brother’s calls it “the nudgies.” This morning, I woke up with that feeling hanging over me, but then I felt a burst of happiness. Why?…

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  • December 4, 2014

    December 4, 2014

    For the last few days I have been walking around with the words to a Robert Frost poem in my head. The poem begins this way: “Oh, stormy stormy world, The days you were not swirled Around with mist and cloud . . .” I’ve memorized the whole of the poem so that I can…

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  • November 6, 2014

    November 6, 2014

    For years, I’ve held on to a card that has a photograph of a dog with his head out the window of a car. He is looking ahead. His fur is blowing back, and his face is the epitome of happiness. I’ve kept the picture to remind me that sticking my head out the window…

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