{"id":125,"date":"2019-06-13T11:55:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-13T11:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/2019\/06\/13\/a-poem-for-thursday-36\/"},"modified":"2020-10-26T21:19:29","modified_gmt":"2020-10-26T21:19:29","slug":"a-poem-for-thursday-36","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/2019\/06\/13\/a-poem-for-thursday-36\/","title":{"rendered":"A Poem for a Thursday #36"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Photo by\u00a0Dawid Zawi\u0142a<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0<\/span>Unsplash<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

It is Wednesday evening as I am writing this and this week feels like it has been five million years long. Five million years filled with niggling annoyances, small disappointments, and way too many trips to the grocery store. Also, I’ve been waking up at 3:00 in the morning with my brain absolutely convinced I need to worry about absolutely ridiculous things. Who needs sleep when you can revisit every awkward or unpleasant conversation you have ever had in your life?<\/p>\n

I meant to write a nice, chatty post earlier this week but my laptop died (see previous paragraph about annoyances and disappointments) so I am only managing my usual Thursday poem post. My husband managed to temporarily resurrect my laptop but its days are numbered and I am writing this expecting it to die again at any moment.<\/p>\n

Today’s poem is by Judith Viorst. I have featured her before<\/a> but this poem seemed like an appropriate choice. Happiness in little things seems like a good goal for the week.<\/p>\n

Happiness<\/i>
\nIs a clean bill of health from the doctor,<\/i>
\nAnd the kids shouldn’t move back home\u00a0<\/i>
\nfor\u00a0<\/i>
\nmore than a year,<\/i>
\nAnd not being audited, overdrawn, in<\/i>
\nWilkes-Barre,<\/i>
\nin a lawsuit or in traction.<\/i>
\n
\n<\/i>
\nHappiness\u00a0<\/i>
\nIs falling asleep without Valium,<\/i>
\nAnd having two breasts to put in my<\/i>
\nbrassiere,<\/i>
\nAnd not (yet) needing to get my blood<\/i>
\npressure lowered,<\/i>
\nmy eyelids raised or a second opinion.<\/i>
\n
\n<\/i>
\nAnd on Saturday nights<\/i>
\nWhen my husband and I have rented<\/i>
\nSomething with Fred Astaire for the VCR,<\/i>
\nAnd we’re sitting around in our robes<\/i>
\ndiscussing,<\/i>
\nThe state of the world, back exercises,<\/i>
\nour Keoghs,<\/i>
\nAnd whether to fix the transmission or<\/i>
\nbuy a new car,<\/i>
\nAnd we’re eating a pint of rum-raisin ice<\/i>
\ncream<\/i>
\non the grounds that\u00a0<\/i>
\nTomorrow we’re starting a diet of fish,<\/i>
\nfruit and grain,<\/i>
\nAnd my dad’s in Miami dating a very nice<\/i>
\nwidow,<\/i>
\nAnd no one we love is in serious trouble<\/i>
\nor pain,<\/i>
\nAnd our bringing-up-baby days are far<\/i>
\nbehind us,<\/i>
\nBut our senior-citizen days have not<\/i>
\nbegun,<\/i>
\nIt’s not what I called happiness<\/i>
\nWhen I was twenty-one,<\/i>
\nBut it’s turning out to be<\/i>
\nWhat happiness is.<\/i>
\n
\n<\/i>
\nHappiness (Reconsidered)<\/i>
\nJudith Viorst<\/p>\n

Reese at Typings<\/a> is sharing another poem this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo by\u00a0Dawid Zawi\u0142a\u00a0on\u00a0Unsplash It is Wednesday evening as I am writing this and this week feels like it has been five million years long. Five million years filled with niggling annoyances, small disappointments, and way too many trips to the grocery store. Also, I’ve been waking up at 3:00 in the morning with my brain absolutely convinced I need to worry about absolutely ridiculous things. Who needs sleep when you can revisit every awkward or unpleasant conversation you have ever had in your life? I meant to write a nice, chatty post earlier this week but my laptop died (see previous paragraph about annoyances and disappointments) so I am only managing my usual Thursday poem post. My husband managed to temporarily resurrect my laptop but its days are numbered and I am writing this expecting it to die again at any moment. Today’s poem is by Judith Viorst. I have featured her before but this poem seemed like an appropriate choice. Happiness in little things seems like a good goal for the week. Happiness Is a clean bill of health from the doctor, And the kids shouldn’t move back home\u00a0 for\u00a0 more than a year, And not being audited, overdrawn, in Wilkes-Barre, in a lawsuit or in traction. Happiness\u00a0 Is falling asleep without Valium, And having two breasts to put in my brassiere, And not (yet) needing to get my blood pressure lowered, my eyelids raised or a second opinion. And on Saturday nights When my husband and I have rented Something with Fred Astaire for the VCR, And we’re sitting around in our robes discussing, The state of the world, back exercises, our Keoghs, And whether to fix the transmission or buy a new car, And we’re eating a pint of rum-raisin ice cream on the grounds that\u00a0 Tomorrow we’re starting a diet of fish, fruit and grain, And my dad’s in Miami dating a very nice widow, And no one we love is in serious trouble or pain, And our bringing-up-baby days are far behind us, But our senior-citizen days have not begun, It’s not what I called happiness When I was twenty-one, But it’s turning out to be What happiness is. Happiness (Reconsidered) Judith Viorst Reese at Typings is sharing another poem this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1629,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poem-for-a-thursday"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2586,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125\/revisions\/2586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}