Happiness is...

Nicole and Coenn

Daddy and daughters

Look at that little face.

Here I am, in California. The evening is cool and cloudless. I spent the day with my sister and nieces, venturing to Toys-R-Us and trying to imitate Wall-E as precisely as possible. Coenn is beautiful and healthy, out of the NICU and growing fast. Ella is an expert in pirates and dinosaurs, and showers me with compliments as we do puzzles together. "You're really good at this!" She says.

Jason was with me for a week, and is now preparing to move to Virginia for his biochemistry program. He'll be essentially doing the first year of med school. I am so excited for him. His hard work is finally paying off.

I don't know what I did to deserve this life. But thank You. Thank You for the love all over my it. For my beautiful family and friends. For Jason, my oasis of sanity and peace and goodness.

It's funny how in such profound joy, I find my heart a little nervous, pleading, Please don't go away! Please let all this joy stick around!

A lesson in that old spiritual discipline of being-in-the-moment, I suppose. One psychologist I read described mental health as "the ability to relax when all is well."

"The opposite of fear is faith."