Year in Review, continued...

Other "If this isn't nice, I don't know what is" moments of 2007. Spending a beautiful, clear night on the beach waiting for sea turtle hatchlings to emerge. Meeting and sharing plants with a kindly, seasoned gardener from the mountains who was immortalized in one of my favorite books. Riding a go-cart at full throttle with my husband. Spending the weekend with my uncle several months before he died. Witnessing 100,000 purple martins come to roost for the night at the Mann's Harbor Bridge in Manteo. Exploring a preserve I'd never heard of near Jockey's Ridge (pictured). Watching the Green Bay Packers kicking butt and taking names! Learning how to make jelly. Eating the first two figs off a three-year-old plant. Getting to hold a piglet. Surprising a coyote.

Nice Moments of 2007

The inimitable Kurt Vonnegut, who died April 11 of this year at the age of 84, had this to say about recognizing and honoring life's sanguine moments:

"And now I want to tell you about my late Uncle Alex. He was my father’s kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well-read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt the agreeable blather to exclaim, 'If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.' I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, 'If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.' "

There were times in 2007 that I felt this way, most certainly not on the day KV died, but most certainly often. I want to be sure I'll remember them, so I'm writing them down.