Low Thrill Threshold and Other Secrets to Happiness

Claire, Jane, Harmony and Max wait for the goods and a chance to get wet

Everything from barefoot beauties driving tractors and otter pops tossed to the crowd (which was only one-person deep and not shoulder to shoulder) to the firetruck's blast high in the air for those willing to get wet, the Panguitch Pioneer-day parade is second only to Kanab's fireworks on the 4th for best summertime small-town celebrations.

Saundra shared an essay with me once about the secret to happiness being having a low thrill-threshhold. I believe it wholeheartedly. More from our low-thrill cabin reunion in Southern Utah:

Making, hiding and finding our own geo-caches

Night hike discovery: tiny glow worms in the low brush beside the dirt road--too bad Ju didn't realize Owen's sippy cup was the ventilated resting place for the one we captured.  Glow little Owie, glimmer, glimmer.....

Spectacular thunder and lightning (nothing makes dirt smell better than rain, especially rain combined with sage and ponderosa)

A perfectly toasted s'more presented by a generous and marshmallowy gifted 14 year old

Sleeping cousins curled up like kittens on the deck as the sun warms them awake.

Bouncing in the pickup on a steep rocky dirt road realizing we've taken a wrong turn somewhere and not caring a bit where we end up

Unplugging and playing hours of card games: Phase 10, Uno, and --in memory of Grandma Bagley--Fourteen on a Corner. (I had to Google it to remember the rules. Irony?)

We've tried all kinds of paint to personalize rocks along the trail, but markers and various kinds of paints were all a "fail" after a year or two of weather. For Christmas, each grandchild received a river rock engraved with their first name, and all but a few are now strategically placed on the trail. Finding a rock with your own name is a thrill time after time.

That fire-engine red claw-foot tub with a good book, handmade soap and time to relax --with water miraculously coming up from the ground clean and abundant!

Einstein said there are two ways to live your life: as if everything is a miracle, or as if nothing is a miracle.  I say the former.