Envy

I always worry about seemingly good people who have trouble envying other people's joy and good fortune. A friend who avoids K and Dave, and their children because he so wants a family and children of his own. Instead of camping out there every weekend, babysitting, and getting the best of both worlds, he denies himself a version of what he loves. Instead of taking the bitter with the sweet, and relishing what he can have that would benefit his friends and their children. He's a very good person, but seems to have gotten a bit lost lately.

What we wish for others is what so often comes to us, in some form, in time, if done with no expectation that we will get a direct one-to-one reward. Life doesn't work like that. But when we want love and comfort and happiness for others, with all our hearts, we open ourselves up to love and comfort and happiness - it's easier for us to see it around us, and it grows better.

The ex, when that relationship deteriorated, hated seeing couples in public, had to turn away, sickened. I gazed at them in awe and pleasure. Maybe I would never find it, but such sweet love existed, and that seemed enough. Just knowing beauty exists in the world, even if I don't own it, lifts me up. I don't have to own the ocean to be glad at how gorgeous it is.

Bitter resentment and jealously only breeds more isolation and pain.

So, although I indulge in whining about my angry, judgmental parents here, I adore hearing about others with warm, friendly families. Mine were a bit of bad luck, and not the worst by any means, but that's all they were. Loving families can happen, I just didn't get that to start out with. Gives me the right to not love the ones I got, because they could have been good, but weren't. Fair deal. And I got better family when I got to chose for myself. Once I was a better person, better people joined in.

We have a friend, with his wife and children, and million dollar home and yearly income, and we are so tickled to see him enjoy his well earned wealth. It suits him, he indulges in toys and gathers in friends, nothing fake or boastful about him. We'd have fun if we came into a fortune, of course.

A common enough speculation, what would we do with a cool million, or ten? Cut back on work, but not stop. Live in a somewhat larger place, that we would own. With ten million, start a non-profit foundation to benefit friends, and friends of friends, who want to try out strange ideas. And build a house on the Northwest coast with lots of guest rooms, and be the vacation spot for everyone we know.