Bloganuary #17

Describe the happiest day of your life.

There are so many as I am usually a very happy person – less so in recent times. However, I am very extrovert and like lots of events involving people. This is part of my problem in more recent times, because I now work for myself from home, use a wheelchair and get out less than I would ideally like. Also, unlike many of the other posts I have seen that cite “marriage” and “having children” as being amongst their happiest memories – I am not married (although have been with the same partner since I was 19 and we have lived together since we were about 24) and have no children (although I have always got on well with other people’s children particularly young children – it’s always so nice to be able to hand them back once they are becoming overexcited).

I have travelled all over the world particularly when I was very much younger – I was lucky enough to go on a cruise to Yugoslavia, Israel, Egypt, Venice and Santorini/Greece when I was 15. I also travelled to Austria, Italy and Bulgaria before the age of 11 (some of it as an “unaccompanied minor” as described in other parts of this blog). In later life have had wonderful holidays in both Canada (Montréal) to watch the Jazz festival and Australia (Sydney) to celebrate New Year and watch the fireworks.

I have been lucky enough to have a good education leading to jobs in engineering and patent law, both of which I have enjoyed and prospered. It is so much easier when you are able to do work that you enjoy, because then it becomes less of a chore and more enjoyable like a game. My jobs have also given me the opportunity to travel to the US and several countries around Europe and meet so many people.

Wherever I have lived I have taken part in so many sports and theatrical performances and I have been in a position to enjoy being with a vast array of different people and personalities. Even now, when I have to admit that enjoyment and happiness has not come so easily – I still get chance to go to music events and festivals, although the travel requires much more preparation and investigation of venues.

Therefore, it is very difficult to pick out “the happiest days of my life”, except to say that I hope my health remains steady and that there are many more wonderful experiences that I have yet to come.