The Happy News thread

[panyasan]

Nice to hear you had such a great trip, Alelou. I heard a lot about your beautiful garden. Do you have pictures of it?

[Alelou]

Enough to make you cry for mercy. However, it's a real mess at the moment and most of the blossoms this time of year are purple, which turn weird shades of blue in photos. One of my goals is to put the better pictures up on Flickr with labels and so forth. I'll let you know when I accomplish that.

Or I'll just throw a photo up later when I get organized.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Thanks! My sister and the baby are doing well, even if the little one is, well, little, since he's four weeks premature.

I even have a present for him already. At KSC I bought a plush space shuttle. Isn't that cute...

[WarpGirl]

How wonderful KTR! Now you must be sure to teach him all about Trek, your fabulous use of words, and of course spoil him! But not spoil him rotten. Oh I am so thrilled for you and your family. Without my little nephew and niece, my life would be so empty. This is truly a wonderful blessing.

[justTripn]

Four weeks earlier than expected, I'm now an uncle. Yesterday my sister gave birth to a baby boy.

Wonderful! Isn't it fun?

[Alelou]

According to a NYTimes article (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/01/healt ... ef=general), we get happy as we get older:

The results, published online May 17 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, were good news for old people, and for those who are getting old. On the global measure, people start out at age 18 feeling pretty good about themselves, and then, apparently, life begins to throw curve balls. They feel worse and worse until they hit 50. At that point, there is a sharp reversal, and people keep getting happier as they age. By the time they are 85, they are even more satisfied with themselves than they were at 18.

In measuring immediate well-being — yesterday’s emotional state — the researchers found that stress declines from age 22 onward, reaching its lowest point at 85. Worry stays fairly steady until 50, then sharply drops off. Anger decreases steadily from 18 on, and sadness rises to a peak at 50, declines to 73, then rises slightly again to 85. Enjoyment and happiness have similar curves: they both decrease gradually until we hit 50, rise steadily for the next 25 years, and then decline very slightly at the end, but they never again reach the low point of our early 50s.

[justTripn]

Yep, in fact I edited a paper on that topic. Also, the pattern of old people being wildly happy (or maybe it was "satisfied") was most pronounced for Americans (perhaps because of the generous social security?) (All this is off the top of my head . . . I should probably just keep my mouth shut.)

But I have an older friend, 55, who claims that after about my age (47) "all the things you used to worry about will seem unimportant and you will feel satisfied with yourself." And that that's what I have to look forward to. This coming from someone who is disabled, lives in constant pain, and whose fiance died about 5 or 6 years ago so that she is currently single. She is very upbeat. She claims she remembers feeling so lonely when she was young and now she is so thankful that she doesn't feel lonely anymore and thinks of peace and quiet as a good thing: "lovely solitude."

[Aikiweezie]

I think that's true (happier as you grow older) but I also read a study that found your 40s is the most stressful for many people because they are in the "sandwich" stage of life. Taking care of both their children and elderly parents. I guess the actual age that this would hit you would depend on how old your parents when they had you and how old your children are. Some of my friends have had to deal with these problems in their 50s.

I have to agree, though, that when I hit 40 I truly no longer cared about trying to impress anyone, or change myself or change anyone else. I finally begaan to feel comfortable in my skin. That is very freeing.

[Alelou]

My poor mother, then. She's in her 70's and dealing with her husband AND her mother. They call her Nurse Jackie.

[Aikiweezie]

My son graduated from Kindergarten today!

[WarpGirl]

YEY! Bring on the ICE CREAM! But they grow so fast don't they? Soon my neice will be starting.

[panyasan]

My son graduated from Kindergarten today!

He is so cute! Is he looking forward to primary school and learning to read and to write?

[Aikiweezie]

Steven LOVES school and is very much looking forward to first grade. Going to school all day is going to be a big transition for both of us, though. I am going to miss him. He can read and write quite a bit already, actually, although he is a little intimidated by "big" words.

[Alelou]

Cute picture!

[Aikiweezie]

BLACKHAWKS WIN THE STANLEY CUP!!!!!!!!!!!!

Woo Hoo!