jam | on happiness

for as long as she could remember, the girl had chased after happiness.  as if, with enough effort and time, she could one day catch it and keep it with her forever.  she, like many others, made the mistake of reifying it, treating the emotion like an object that could be kept by her bedside and held close on dark nights.  she wanted to preserve it.  mimicking the way that she and her mother used to package the jam that they made, she collected her sweetest memories and placed them in jars that she created in her mind.  she labelled them 'happiness' and lined them up as a reminder that she had felt this way before and in hopes that she would feel this way again.

as time wore on, some of the jars were broken, some of them were spilled, and some of them were simply lost in the messiness and busyness of life.  the girl found that it was becoming increasingly difficult to replace her jars.  there were cold spells and seasons of melancholy that made growth hard and she slowly began to forget the recipe for happiness.  it seemed that the harder she tried the find it, the more distant the elusive emotion was.  she searched and searched and searched, and was occasionally rewarded by kind words or a warm embrace from a loved one, but the moments were fleeting.

she kept living.  like clockwork, she dragged herself through the monotonous motions that were expected of her.  she tried to practice collecting happiness.  she filled countless jars of jam, but they were made only to be sold.

the week before her 20th birthday she sat on the side of the road.  the chair she used was worn and rocked, its legs unbalanced by the grooves that had been carved by the recent rains.  the jewelled glass that held the jams reflected the setting sun.  its candy colours and the faint smell of  strawberries reminded her of the carefree childhood she had had.  she had not lived the life that she had dreamt of.

she knew better now.  she no longer blindly chased after happiness.  she had learned that happiness is not a thing.  unlike the jam that she was so familiar with, one cannot make or keep or buy or sell it.  rather, it is the product of an experience, something unique to every individual.  one must be patient.  happiness comes and goes as it pleases, never staying in one place for too long, but never leaving the girl to fend for herself.  begging and pleading it to stay only served to scare it away.

swept away in the clutter of her thoughts, the girl was startled to find a presence by her side.  like an old friend, happiness settled in the empty seat that he mother used to occupy.  the girl smiled and slowly raised her hand and rested it on the table in front of her, palm facing upwards.  it was an unspoken thanks and an invitation for happiness to stay, even if only for a little while.



hello!  this is a little piece that i wrote a long time ago, but felt like sharing.  i hope that you liked it.