How strange it is to be up and bright in the morning! A good sleep turns me into a morning person – never thought that would happen. Everything is fresh and bright; full of possibilities. I’m not dreading what the day will bring.
I feel guilty for feeling good. I’m feeling better and enjoying life and my friend is in hospital after trying to end hers. I sympathise with her, and know how she is feeling but I shouldn’t feel guilty about feeling well.
I’m a separate person- I’m allowed to feel good when others don’t. It sounds selfish, and maybe it is, but I spent so long caught up in other people’s moods. If someone in my family was depressed, then I had to be too. I thought it was insensitive to smile or laugh and enjoy myself so I acted low, then I began to feel it too.
Maybe being selfish is my way free of this – free to feel good without guilt and not be dragged down by others. Still, my friend is in hospital. I sympathise but I cannot live like that. Hiding how I feel will not change anything for her. I spent too long feeling down to reject a moment of happiness when it comes.
I wish for her a bright morning full of possibility, I wish for her a good day and I would tell her the same ad nauseam phrase that everyone says: “It will get better”. And it will even though its hard for you to believe right now.
Happiness by Raymond CarverSo early it's still almost dark out. I'm near the window with coffee, and the usual early morning stuff that passes for thought. When I see the boy and his friend walking up the road to deliver the newspaper. They wear caps and sweaters, and one boy has a bag over his shoulder. They are so happy they aren't saying anything, these boys. I think if they could, they would take each other's arm. It's early in the morning, and they are doing this thing together. They come on, slowly. The sky is taking on light, though the moon still hangs pale over the water. Such beauty that for a minute death and ambition, even love,doesn't enter into this. Happiness. It comes on unexpectedly. And goes beyond, really,any early morning talk about it.
