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What makes you feel fortunate, alive, happy...what makes you smile at the sky? For me it is many things, but mostly it is the contrast between the last few summers of my life and this summer.

For quite a number of years, I had allowed some things to become presences in my life that made it less than wonderful. Dealing with those things kept me from being true to myeself and from being really in touch with what, to me, are the essences of life. For the past month I have been feeling more and more alive, and more fortunate, than I have in years.

For the past few years, I had not planted much in my garden and, when I did, it mostly went to weeds as I couldn't deal with the heat, humidity, mosquitos and horseflies to weed and harvest it. Me, someone who comes from a long line of gardeners, who had always smiled SO widely the first time I could get out each spring and feel the warmth of the sun on my face, get dirt on my knees, under my fingernails, between my toes, while putting in peas and spinach and radishes as soon as the ground here warmed up enough to work with six inches of mud!

Also for the last few years I have felt depressed, tired, and have even battled a vitamin deficiency. I made some changes, took back my life, and now I have been feeling more and more energetic. I put out the cranky man who had been living with me for ten years; got rid of a dangerous dog and adopted a sweet one (plus two girl cats destined for the smokehouse, if you know what that means).

I began to nurture relationships with the wonderful, wide variety of people I work with, and began working on my house, adding porches, refinishing floors, etc. I planted herbs and vegetables. Perhaps most importantly, I found this forum last year, a few months into my quit, while experiencing some real distress - I was having trouble breathing and had chest tightness.

I do think that my vitamin B deficiency was due to stress, even though the doctors don't see it that way. But when I pick up a B complex vitamin jar it says "stress tabs." I believe that the stress of not living my life well, living with people who caused me stress, drained these vitamins in me. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel so much better.

I am at a point where I see how precious every day is, and how wonderful every green thing growing. I have to stop and study large spiders making webs, find pictures in the shapes of clouds, breathe in the wonderful scents of the woods, fresh cut hay, and wood smoke, and NOT breathe deeply the smell of second hand cigarette smoke.

Someone on this forum recently mentioned the scent of clean hair, unsullied by cigarette smoke. I remembered this as I took a barette out of my hair today, shook my head and still, after two days, smelled the fresh scent of my shampoo. For years my hair, clothes, car, house, had reeked of tobacco smoke! I used to drive to see a boyfriend who didn't like that smell with a scarf around my hair while I smoked as much as I could before I got there. Ugh!

Life without cigarettes is a wonderful garden, and I feel that all of you here on this forum are special plants in that garden. Some fleeting and fragile like a sweet petunia, others rugged and strong like a spiderwort. All beautiful in a unique way, all special, all beloved.

Thanks to any of you who have read this ramble, thanks to all of you for being here, you have helped me find renewal. You are all wonderful and special, and I am so glad I have met you.