The Gift of Thinking

I had an epiphany the other day. I was casually walking through the mall with my boyfriend. We had a certain feeling of lightheartedness as we made our way through the throng of people. We were very pleased in our relaxed state as we took ganders in odd shops and moved with the flow of traffic around us. In order to celebrate our mood we decided to buy ourselves Red Mango frozen yogurt. I purchased my favorite, the original flavor with mango, raspberries, mochi, and white chocolate chips. I was contentedly eating my frozen delight when it hit me, like a brick to the skull. I felt.... happy?
Yes, happy.
It was unlike anything I'd ever experienced before. Now I'm not saying that I have never been happy, but I had never recognized it. You might be thinking that that is extremely sad. My friend, it is...
My life has been a series of ups and downs. Sometimes I feel like the downs occur more often than the ups. But I don't want you to think that I am some type of emo person sitting in the corner slitting my wrists, or that I am a huge pessimist that always sees the glass half empty. It's just at that moment in the mall I had never realized all the things I had to be happy for, despite some of the negative things that have happened in my life. I just realized that I am happy being me; happy to be with my boyfriend, happy to have been eating ice cream at the mall and watching people around me live their lives. Life is a beautiful thing and so quickly it can end, without so much as a kiss and a wink. Why should I spend it worrying about tomorrow and fretting about today? Obviously this concept is not a new one, and I fear that I have begun to sound trite. It was just my personal epiphany, and one that I have gladly opened up to and accepted. One of my very favorite sayings pretty much sums it up to a T, "Yesterday was history, tomorrow's a mystery, but right now is a gift and that's why they call it the present."