Inertia

I live in an old house and in the yard is an overgrown Mock Orange bush. When we first moved here many many years ago we considered pulling it up. We never did and it has become one of my favorite things in the world. When it is having a good spring it is covered in little white blossoms and the whole yard smells of its sweetly citrus fragrance. It hums with the activity of hundreds of bees for about a week and then inevitably the petals fade and fall and the show is over until next year. I think of my younger self standing in front of that shrub pondering it's fate and am grateful for the inertia that kept it from destruction. I have been lucky that way - many things have worked out in ways that I could not have possibly foreseen. Yet, I am considered a failure. Once at a doctors office they were taking my history "Job?" No "Children?" No "Spouse?" Yes. At which point the nurse laughed and said "Well at least you've got that!!" Imagine if I had flunked that measurement of worth also. Failure does not by itself bring unhappiness, it is very liberating and I do feel myself free of so many of the constraints that seems to rob others of being able to enjoy the small pleasures of this life. I sit in the warm spring sun and and revel in the transitory beauty of the mock orange and fear the question, "What did you do today?"