It was winter 20 years ago, I’ve been wandering for some time in my garden, after the huge fight we had at home with my parents. I loved them very much, yet, no one could run away from widely known truth, ‘ the more you love,the more you hate’. All three of us had the same character, the same personality and the very exact way of thinking, what led to monoteus disagreement and contradicting opinions. No one would have admit their fault, no one in our house was capable of of the world sorry, so we argued endlessly. That winter the day was as always, we gave performance of our own stubbornness, and i left the house heading to the nearest lake. Time went fast as i was angerly walking around, to let go of my overwhelming thoughts and words that i meant to say to my mum hours ago. My whole body was fullfilled with infuriation and sadness, tears were coming to eyes as I tried to forget and find peace in nature. Hours have passed, the blue, sunnny skies was going away to gloomy and dark night, when I stumbled upon a sitting man under the tree.

The man looked familiar, although i kept on walking, fearing that he may be one of ‘this men’ in 21st century. I’ve lost trust to men long time ago after what happened to me when i was a kid, time healed my wounds, yet my mind always remained untrusted. As I walked, i tried not to pay attention to him, as he was struggling to stand up. My kind heart stared saying “ what a poor soul, maybe he deserves to help him, maybe he is just a kind, old men in need of some help”. I stopped in the middle of the path and my overthinking brain began fight, “should i approach him, or should i not”. Decision was made, we believe in kindness of this world, so i went to him.

It turned that he was a very good and friendly person and he just left his home, about mile away, to get peace and quiet and think. He started telling me stories of his life, memories from childhood and youth, i heard how beautiful was his wife and how happy and fullfilled his dear life was. My mind was everywhere, i expiernced together with him moments from the world was two, his wedding in Sicily, all travels around the world, from japan to New Zealand. He could talk like that for hours, and when he finished i asked one question, “What have you been loooking for, what was the thing that you’ve been gong after in all this countries, why haven’t you sat in one bloody place, but went to all this various places…?”. He answered simply, “i was looking for happiness?”.

I should start here what is happiness for me, before i will tell the rest of the story. Well, there is no one definition I believe, my grandma used to say that it is just the state, my lectures said that we all are looking for it and chasing it throughout our whole life. No one really knows what is that, where is it, and why we look for it, yet we are in constant chase. Some find it in money, just temporarily, but they do. Others see it on a deathbed, and the rest long ago forgot about it, they just live, with no purpose. Life goes and doesn’t stop and they keep on living the way they want with no reason, no target. That is one way of living, carelessly. I prefer this bumpy road that endlessly brings us challenges and opportunities equally. You can win,you can lose, the chances are similar, and it is up to you if you remain in the down or you climb to reach high. This is happiness for me,its the way of living fully, trying, laughing, breathing, dancing and seeing beauty around you. “Am I happy?”, I do not think so, but I believe deeply that one day i will be. “Have i ever been happy?”, i think so i was, there were moments of eternal happiness and gratitude,then they faded, and new ones came. After all the choice is ours if we want to be happy here and now, or not. So,happiness is for me way of being, way of living fully with no expectations and regrets, as when something happend,we can reverse the time, “Don’t we?”

…and the old man said

- “listen there is no such a thing, thought or feeling like hapinness, i am happy, you may not be happy. I am choosing to be happy every day, no matter what the world brings me. After all i have experienced, after i was chaising it for such a long time,after 70 years have passed, i have decided to be happy, and to stop looking for it everywhere. I don’t expect, i do. I don’t regret, i move forward not backward. I don’t read the same chapter twice, as I know what happed there. That is what life has thought me. Some days are hard, others are not, people are not always kind and nice, they can be cruel, yet you decide who to love. Emotions indeed can be messy and not always helpful, but without listening to your heart, the world loses it colours. Paint it the way you want, once in black, then in red and finish with yellow. Throughout your whole life you make aquintance with all these colors, and at the end you chose, with which you paint your own painting of life”

He went home and i followed suit, thinking whether i just have met the happiest person in the world,or was it just the reflection of my own life.