I delight in the things I discover right within reach. At sixty-one years of age, I have seen, within a short distance from my house, my first moondog and my first bobcat. Sue, who owns the golden retriever, told me she'd recently seen a fox. I have lived in the country for sixteen years and have yet to come upon a fox, though I have seen dozens of coyotes. I have since been squinting into the distance, hoping to see the same brushy tail she saw raised, and the fine red winter coat and the black eyes looking back.
To be happy, according to Webster, is to be favored by luck or fortune, and the first syllable of happiness, hap— with its luckiness, its chanciness, its sudden surprises — is a source of much delight in my life.
— Ted Kooser, Local Wonders