Flashback to happiness

Two weeks ago we started a new bi-weekly feature in The Happiness Plan called Flashback to Happiness, where we invite readers to share with us a happy moment in their lives. Got a great moment to tell us about? Contact us at pplum@sympatico.ca and you might be featured in a future column.

The reader: Mary Cassell

Who is she? A 68-year-old grandmother in Exeter, Ont.

Her Happy Moment: The smell of orange blossoms in June.

Why it’s so memorable: I was 31 years old and at the time my three oldest children were two, four and six years old. We all lived in a big farm house in Exeter that had a room on the bottom floor that we used for toys, laundry and my sewing desk. And right outside that window a vibrant mock orange blossom was blooming with the most heavenly smell. I was sewing in that room one early summer day and a breeze brought the scent of that shrub right through the room. The children were playing well, I was doing what I loved to do and I remember taking a minute and thinking that life just did not get any better than that – my kids, my husband, my hobby, everything.

In honour of that moment, and to keep reminding myself that life is indeed wonderful, I have planted a mock orange blossom at every house where I have lived since. Even when more difficult times have arisen in my life, every June that scent reminds me of great times in the past. Now that my children are in their 40s, and they all have children of their own, they love to hear the story of that moment and the reason why that shrub is in the garden of our new home.

Got a great moment to tell us about? Please share it!