At peace...

Serenity. The dictionary defines it as being "a state or quality of calm, eveness of temper, composed, and at peace". There are lots of different derivatives of this...lots of different ways to say it, but I like this one the best because it uses "at peace". One of my favorite chick flicks has a line of dialogue in it that states "for a split second, everyone is healthy, everyone is happy and in that moment, you have peace" (ten points to anyone who knows what movie that is from). A state of peace or serenity is not easy to achieve and what's more, it's infrequency makes it harder to identify when you finally do reach it. In today's rat-race, we move at constant high speeds and rarely stop to smell the roses. It's go-speed racer-go all the time and I think that we sometimes forget to recognize the things that are really important. It doesn't take long to revel in a moment. A moment, by definition, is short. So why don't we do that more often? I've had a few of those moments in the last year. One was with my nephew...just the two of us looking at each other for what seemed like hours (but really was about a minute). We connected that day. Another moment was with my dog. It was a sun-shiny day and all the windows were open. He was lying down in front of the sliding glass door, just watching the world. So I laid down next to him for a while. We watched the world together. I got a few puppy kisses in the process. Over the fourth of July weekend, I took this photo. It's our dock up at the cabin. This moment screams "serenity" to me. I was happy to capture it. When I look at that photo, I can get lost in it all over again. When was the last time you felt at peace?