Life's Many Sunsets

Sunset presents a different picture for me. Most recently I spend the beginning of my day watching sunsets. I’m one of the very lucky few to have a corner office with an exquisite view of the sunset. Sunsets are like yellow-orange curtains of embers closing in on the last splashes of our daylight lives. It’s strange but wonderful at the same time to watch the slow virtually creeping changes of light, colors and darkness that mark what to most people is the end of the day.

As the sun slowly but surely starts its sleep where the sky meets the horizon I reflect about what my day has been: The new acquaintances, the petty arguments, the meaningful conversations with friends, the funny things happening at the pantry, the lectures from the boss, parting words to co-workers, an act of charity, the smell of perfume, the aroma of coffee, the right words said at the wrong moment, the words still left unspoken, the many ways I said “I Love You”, the sound of rain on the glass pane, the chatter of pedestrian on the way home, and then the beautiful sound of piano slowly floating in the air....

I wonder if my Marilyn is looking at the same sunset and thinking of me. Is she seeing the same beautiful colors and patiently awaits as the day sleeps. I wonder. For that few moments time seem to slow down as I watch the last rays of sunlight disappear behind the lines of the horizon and come to the reality that night is indeed taking ownership of my day.

To some, sunsets are stories of things gone, things lost, of life’s many ending moments. In many stories of lore, we find sad, lonely tales of grieving, of broken hearts, of love ones departing, of happy days coming to a close, and always the feeling of longing. Sunsets are affirmation of the world turning, of tides ebbing, and the loose understanding of change. Many dread the ending of the day manifested by the sunset for to them it is the end of what is supposed to be a happy or wonderful day. Many a tear has fallen over the excruciatingly painful transformation of the last moment of the day into a rolling tide of darkness as if tomorrow is not worth anticipating.

We must see ourselves as a witness to life’s grand plan by seeing the sunset as mere transitions of our days, of life’s ever changing moments and a curtain closing to mark the opening of a new show.

I have always look at sunset as spectacular sight for the eyes like a tiny show of natural colors. I have watched it with my children, my wife and friends. I intend to see more of it in this lifetime. Sunsets are just as beautiful as our sunrise. While sunrise is the awakening of our day, sunset is a send off that starts a journey.

Love, Life and Happiness

With better living conditions, more affluence, better health, more sophisticated technology and more educated population, we should be looking at a more happier world.

The reality is the world is becoming a lonely place. A receptacle for millions of residual manifestations of despair. People are driven to lunacy, suicide, war, genocide, and find romantic heroism in euthanasia. Ordinary people are less trusting now yet equate love with happiness and love with sex and sex with love, and perpetually confused why they can’t have both love and happiness.

Even our mundane excuse for conversations are becoming a jostling of “I am better than you” or “my race is superior than yours” talk relentlessly putting one over the other. Young people don’t even say “hello” anymore to neighbors confusing “Yo” with “Good Morning!”

How are we going to know each other if we don’t even greet each other? How are we going to see each other if we don’t even stop to look? How are we going to greet each other when even our text messages are so quick people don’t even bother to put syllables in between consonants anymore? It is amazing that we want most of the things now, fast, big, chunks of endless things and still unhappy. We are so driven to excess all for the sake of seeking out happiness and what we gain is despair.

Very early on when I was in college, I have decided that I had enough of despair and unhappiness. I just decided that nothing or nobody determines what, how, when, how long, with whom or with what can I gain my happiness. I just decided that everyday is a reason to be happy simply because I’m alive.

I stopped thinking about myself and just started looking at things beyond me. I began looking at other people’s lives and got more interested with them than with mine. Before I always saw life as “he is better than me”, “smarter than me”, “ better looking than me” and it became an endless cycle of let down that drowns your day worst than a tsunami. I started to look at people’s faces, their eyes, and smiled. People simply smiled back and it became a slow and sure flow towards my awakening. Indeed I became wide awake. I can now sense happiness in people’s lives and became drawn to it. I soon realized that I was swimming in a sea of very happy people before I became conscious of it. They were just around all along.

Seeing the world in another way is difficult if you feel too much of your own pain and looking inwardly into your own despair. It’s like a house with too many windows all of them close and curtains drawn together. The air will be heavy, the room will be dark and the only sound you hear is your own voice and your not even talking to yourself.

Before when I see people do something like drawing or painting, I just see people holding a pen, brush or paper. Now I see the gentle motion of their strokes as they sweep the brush across that white paper. I see the directions of swirling lines put together to show a face or a fiery yet gentle color of sunset done in acrylic on canvass. It was strange how differently my very own eyes see the same world in a different perspective. Gently, simply, quietly, I felt happiness filling me with fresh air like a trek to the woods or the mountain during the break of dawn. In the passing years, I have learned to fill my life with happiness simply because I have decided to do so like drinking water.

The girl who always annoys you maybe a good Samaritan volunteering her time to take care of old people. And the world has no idea that you spent your whole life taking care of someone who can’t walk, or can’t see or can’t even stand up. You can be a hero but it does not matter anymore because what matters is what you feel about yourself. You are whole now by just choosing to be happy. Happiness is where you go home to.

Take stock of what you have. Value any friendship you have and keep them. Help others. Say thank you as often and apologize just as many times.  Be kind to yourself so others will feel the same way about you. Don’t seek out happiness. Give it and find out how much happiness you really have. Nurture love the way you do with happiness and live life healthy enough to realize, it has always been around.