Moments

Moments. What's in a moment? I believe it's those fleeting seconds where you're heart is racing so fast your head can't keep up. And then after the moment is gone words can never truly explain the meaning of all the emotions behind those feelings occurring. Moments. They happen everyday. True, some are more trivial than others, but who would we be without each defining moment in our everyday life.

I may be contradicting myself. You may be thinking, "Danielle, what does it matter whether I get a bagel or a donut? That cannot possibly be a defining moment" Well, maybe its not your defining moment but have you ever stopped to wonder that maybe you are shaping someone else's defining moment. All I'm saying is, do you remember that day when there was one strawberry donut left waiting for you. You eyes open with wonder and amazement because you are on this shitty ship. There are no frosted flakes left. The eggs are overcooked. The hash browns are soggy but there right in front of you lies one strawberry donut. All of those sailors in front of you must have helped to define your moment of bliss, and may very well have turned your whole day around, just by making the simple decision of not eating the strawberry donut.

I believe that if you give yourself the opportunity, moments can bring miracles to your life. Some of the best moments I've had in my life come out of love, sharing car rides with my brother listening to music and not talking for hours. In these hours, we aren't uncomfortable or awkward but rather drifting through life in happiness and the simplicity of being. The simplicity of a great song coming on the radio. Or the simplicity of the day being beautiful with the windows rolled down. So many people take the little things for granted.

People say I'm ditsy and/or easy to please, always smiling and so positive, well no shit Sherlock, I am. If not for the little things in life, I wouldn't be able to set myself apart from all of you. Go ahead and make fun of my excitement over coffee, or my wonder in exploring the ship, I guarantee, my day will be essentially better and filled with more life and experience than yours.

So many individuals wake up on the wrong side of the rack, in a horrible mood, whining about how shitty the day is going to be. It's 5:30 in the morning, what has possibly occurred to make  you be in a bad mood. You are setting yourself up for failure, my friend, you aren't even giving yourself the opportunity to be happy. Seriously, how hard is it to wake up and make a conscious decision to be happy. Just wake up happy. And if you wake up unhappy, change your mind.

But back to moments, there is a specialness of re living them in your head. This alone, is why I keep a journal and write everything down. Who doesn't want to re-live that magical moment of your first kiss together on the couch, waiting for the movie to end in hopes that he too has been thinking about everything but the movie playing. Even if, years later, things didn't work out and your are 10,000 miles away from each other. I re live that moment quite frequently. I can remember how happy I was. I couldn't even contain my smile in a kiss. There's a beauty to that, you know?

Sometimes I have a hard time writing down my moments. I'll either underplay them in my journal because I cannot find the words to explain the magic or I'll upstage the moment and write it to how I wanted it to happen. But I am the author to my own life, so this is not a crime, it will just change the way I look at things.  Writing these moments down helps me to discover myself and my true feelings. Keeping opinions locked inside is easy. It's when you write them down do you truly identify hidden motives and meanings. Admitting to yourself on how you feel by writing it down is far more dangerous than just thinking about things. . Its there in black and white, and no matter what you do, you can't escape it.

Moments. You can't control how they affect you. You can't control how you feel. But you can control whether you want that moment forever. You can decide if you want it to live on. You can decide to transform it into a memory. I transform many of my moments into memories by writing them down. And the one's I don't write down, well they're there too.

DG