Embracing a Perfect Day

When I was 15 years old, I had a perfect day. I boy I liked in high school liked me, too. He asked me to the school dance, and we went, and we had a great time, and he kissed me goodnight, which at 15 was a perfect date and a perfect day. I remember coming into the house after this perfect date and kiss goodnight and being so happy, and I found my mother sleeping on the couch. I thought this was strange, but I was busy being happy, so I said goodnight. The next morning, my parents said they were getting divorced.

In my 15-year-old mind, I turned this into a condemnation of having the “perfect” day. If I ever allowed myself to feel happy and at peace and content with the world as it is, I thought, disaster would surely strike. You might think that nearly 30 years of life experiences would help me reject this silly notion, but it is amazing how we hold on to supposed truths we learned as kids. There have been many times I have had wonderful days and wonderful experiences and wanted to be happy and at peace and content, but I have always reminded myself of that day and told myself, no, you never know what might happen and you have to guard against the foolish notion that contentedness and peace are things you’ll get to experience without a counterbalance -- for you, Erin, the yin of happiness shall be followed by the yang of crisis.

Today is one of those days. I had a wonderful day. Everything that I thought might happen has happened and every way that I envisioned this day would go has gone that way. There is not a single thing that I would change about this day. I began my adventure, post-editorial committee meeting, by taking a taxi to the Wal-Mart of Puerto Vallarta, where I knew I could catch the bus to Sayulita, the pueblo where I had made hotel reservations. That went as planned: I picked up a few necessities at Wal-Mart, I went to the bus stop, I caught the bus to Sayulita (which was not the higher-end inter-city bus I expected, but was really better, because it was an un-airconditioned, bouncy bus that made many stops along the way and on which I was the only gringo, which let me feel, at least for the moment, that I had strayed off the “beaten path”). I arrived about an hour later, walked around the pueblo, and saw the perfect combination of a non-touristy town that yet had a sprinkling of occasional tourists and signs in English. I then took a taxi to my hotel, which was the perfect distance away from the town, so that I could not stop grinning as the taxi pulled into this tiny oasis on the sea. I checked into my room, which is feet from the ocean, eclectic and small and quaint and perfect, got a tour of the grounds, waded in the surf, sat in a beach chair to read, and then met Jose, a waiter who has entirely embraced his new role as my personal Spanish teacher. I later enjoyed “happy hour” (two-for-one drinks -- two for me!) with perfect white wine and a beautiful sunset. I ordered from the menu where every single dish, including the green salad, has a recommended wine pairing (do you see what I mean about perfect for me?), and then skipped straight to dessert (perfect!). Now I sit on the terrace of my casita and listen to the surf and think and write and look forward to yoga tomorrow morning, and kayaking, and seeing more whales (saw some spouts today offshore).

There is nothing about this day that I would change. It fills me with dread to write that, but one goal of this journey is to work on self-awareness and mindfulness. Thus, I am aware that the fear of accepting a perfect day is something I need to overcome. Tomorrow the sun will rise, and the world will not end, and crises will not befall me, and I will have a day after that (however less than perfect it might be), and a day after that, and a day after that.