Moments of bliss

I'm a procrastanator and a perfectionist - two traits which don't go together all that well. What it means is that I spend a lot of my free time thinking about what I should be doing instead of just letting go and enjoying whatever it is that I'm doing. For example, as I type this entry, I'm thinking about this afternoon's bake sale and the notebook sitting next to me at the table - the ones I should be grading and will be in a few minutes.

Every now and then, however, there have been and continue to be moments in my life when the brain lets go and just revels in the moment, when the bliss takes over and all is well with the world.

Today I present you with descriptions of a few of those moments...and I ask you to share one of your own, a moment when everything, every thought, every bit of the rest of the world went away from you, a time when you lived purely and totally in the moment...

• Each time I look up at the sky and see Orion - ideally in early morning hours of a winter day. - I've lost touch with a friend (entirely my fault here) out in the City of Angels who loved looking up at Orion herself. And every time I see the belt and the sword, I think of her. It's a shame that I haven't been more regular in my contact with her.
• Senior awards chapel at Wabash when I won the chemistry leadership award. - There was an award for the outstanding student teacher. I expected to win that one - there were only about a half dozen of us student teaching that semester, and I thought I was hot stuff. But when Dr Dallinger began the announcement for one of the chemistry awards by saying (I'm paraphrasing here) "We have an outstanding chemistry class this year with a dozen chemistry majors. Six are headed to chemistry graduate school, two to law school, two to med school, one to English grad school, and one to high school. It is to this last that we present this award." And I went away. I couldn't catch my breath, couldn't hear another thing he said. I received the award in front of the entirety of the senior class and assembled parents - including mine. I've won a few academic-type awards in my time, but this one shocked and honored me as much as any that I've ever gotten.
• After the first few runners come across the finish line at our 5K...in the middle of the second set of Rock 4A Cause. - Our students (especially those of you who make up a fair portion of this blog's readership) do amazing, phenomenal things to raise around $40,000 every year for the LLS (our total this year will be announced in the first week of April). Calen and I do a lot of work behind the scenes and in other ways, and we both tend to be about as tense as possible as our two largest events head toward their dates. But once things are underway and working, you'll typically find me in the lobby of the concert or at the finish line of the 5K with the biggest grin on my face. Everybody is enjoying themselves, and it's because of something that I've helped birth, and they're all having a great time 4A Cause. It's an amazing feeling.
• As I stood there taking my vows at my wedding. - We had an outdoor wedding at Locust Grove on Easter Saturday and had absolutely no decent backup plans at all. If it had rained on us, we'd've been crammed into their reception hall with a very uncomfortable ceremony. It poured on Thursday all day long - until our rehearsal. Friday it was crystal clear, and they mowed the grass. Saturday was gorgeous - 75 degrees with crystal blue skies. On Easter Sunday they had ten inches of rain and horrific flood warnings.
  
  But for us, it was perfect. I was surrounded by the people who meant the most to me in the world, and I was marrying a beautiful woman. It was one of the best parties I've ever been to, and easily the best one that I've ever thrown. It was so beautiful, in fact, that the photographers kept the album as an advertisement for the next year...and that certainly wasn't because The Girl and I are that gorgeous as far as people go.
• Sitting on the beach at 4am on my last day in Aberdeen, Scotland. - I'd spent nine months in Aberdeen - eight, really, with the rest around Scotland, England, and the continent. And I'd never seen the sun rise over the North Sea. I got up at 3:30, knocked on Luke's window but let him sleep as he was enjoying the company of a lass who he'd finally worked up the courage to chat up the night before, so I headed down to the North Sea alone - a fifteen minute walk in the darkness. And I waited for the fun to rise on my last day in Aberdeen. I have a gorgeous panoramic of the sunrise to keep the memories fresh, and my parents had it mounted for my Christmas present that year.
• This weekend during warmups for New Albany's game against Brownsburg. - I've left the nest and headed two hours upriver from The Family Manse. I love where I live now and wouldn't trade my life for anything. But there is something so familiar and wonderful about going home from time to time, and this weekend screamed that at me as I stood up and cheered for the home team, surrounded by 7000+ Hoosiers in a high school gymnasium. The blind fervor, the excitement, the feeling of being part of a seventy-year-old tradition. It was amazing and so comforting, and I felt at home, something that I rarely connect with. I'm the one who left, and there aren't a lot of times when I miss home, but I missed it palpably this weekend.

And when have you been in bliss?