The past few days have taught me new things about happiness.

We have been able to get out into the snow to play. The temperatures have risen above 0 degrees and we are largely recovered from the bronchitis both of us developed as a result of the viruses that have been roaming the country looking for likely hosts.

We have been working on the final versions of our house plans and many questions have come up about “what did you have before? Was it enough? Did you want more?” Of course we can only go on memory since the counter tops, hallways, linear feet of closet space, space between the potty and the wall have all vanished. They all became ash on June 28, 2012.

A while back it struck me I could figure out the size of many things based on the tiles in the photos. I could tell from looking which are 12 inch and which are 6. Most of the photos you can simply count the number of tiles. Sometimes the ones in the further reaches of the photo fade out. I learned that if you dramatically underexpose the photo and increase the contrast and the fill flash you can make the lines pop.

We learn that little things can make you happy. You don’t have to have the
“big event” to be able to live life well. We knew that getting outside in the mountains made us happy. We did not know that 6 inch tiles would make us happy.

The fire continues to teach us things that we did not know. Sometimes the lessons, like the 6 inch tiles, are simple and rejuvenating. We are eager to learn the next lesson in rejuvenation.

//