Contentment
I had a conversation with a woman who had just bought a 40-pound bag of chicken. She was ecstatic about her purchase. She rattled off the near endless amount of ways she and her husband would prepare and eat their way through the near infinite supply of chicken she now possessed. There would be lunch chicken, dinner chicken, and, most perplexingly, breakfast chicken (which is dinner chicken, but eaten the next morning). What terrified me the most is that she was content. She was just happy to have her husband and her chicken sack.
I don’t mean to belittle her purchases, or her for that matter. Over the past four years I’ve tried to find the keys to happiness, and these searches have come to many, abrupt, dead ends. And there was a person who had figured it out, and I was horrified that happiness could be a 40-pound bag of chicken. I saw contentment and I didn’t want it. I didn’t want any part of it. Her smile was genuine and her eyes were glazed over, maybe all she had left was chicken and a husband. But she was fine with it! I just never want to find a sense of adventure in the deli aisle of a No Frills. Maybe I’m missing out – I’m probably in the wrong. But if happiness is someone who loves you, and a 40-pound sack of chicken. I’m fine being discontented for a little while longer.