Delight is Easy to Come By

Lately, I’ve been noticing how easy it is to come by delight.

Not big, memorable, bucket-list delight. Just the ordinary kind that shows up when you’re paying attention: a ridiculous rabbit, a good golf swing, a cucumber, a dog in a life jacket.

Here are 20 things that have delighted me lately.

1. Our first pickleball win. I will not qualify it with the conditions of the win.

2. A local bunny rabbit whose back legs get a little more excited than the rest of him, so he appears to hippity-hop around to a very strange beat.

3. Cookie Monster leading “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” during the seventh-inning stretch of a recent Cubs game—and the two Gen X announcers absolutely delighted to be in the company of such a celebrity.

4. A partial lunar eclipse viewed from the deck on a slightly cool and breezy August night.

5. One of those golf swings that feels effortless yet sends the ball farther and straighter than all the overthought ones.

6. The neighborhood moose finally returning—the bull resting in the shade in our yard while the cow and twins keep their distance.

7. Little snakes slithering around next to the golf course pond. Just kidding. That nearly erased all the delight from the other things on this list.

8. An audiobook that makes you drive a little slower so you can listen longer. The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett.

9. Cash taking a swim. He entered the lake from the back of the boat, apparently trying to help Bob, who was also in the water. Either way, Cash demonstrated a pretty good dog paddle and looked adorable in his bright yellow life jacket.

10. Afternoon naps. I used to think naps were a waste of life. Now I think they’re delightful little pockets of quiet in the middle of a day.

11. Against all odds, one tiny cucumber finally emerging.

12. Feet with flip-flop tan lines. A telltale sign of a very good summer.

13. Four hummingbirds sharing a single feeder at the same time. The territorial bully hummingbird must have been out of town.

14. Wildflowers that keep being showy with absolutely no attention from me or my weeding gloves.

15. Those days when the lake earns its reputation as the Caribbean of the Rockies.

16. Realizing I can still get better. I’m not running as well as my 40-year-old self did, but my 60-year-old self is running better than my 59-year-old self. I’ll take the win.

17. Making a good meal with whatever happens to be in the fridge. That’s all on Bob. I just get to eat it. He rarely disappoints.

18. Fresh-baked bread from a recipe and ingredients gifted by two friends, baked in the handmade Dutch oven that was part of the gift.

19. A good rain shower that leaves everything feeling a little cleaner, outside and in.

20. BLTs with fresh, homegrown tomatoes.

Twenty delightful things. And I didn’t even have to try very hard.

Except for the pickleball win.

We definitely had to try for that.