Zoom zoom stop

Fun with a rental car
Woodstock, ON, July 2011

About this photo: It's rough week at Written Inc. - in more ways than one. You can get in on the photographically rough action by clicking here. It won't hurt a bit.

I'm slowly, almost fitfully learning to appreciate that life isn't about big things, destinations or accolades. It's about finding, similarly slowly, that there's joy in the little things, in squeezing everything possible out of however many everyday moments we've been given, in looking inward instead of outward for validation, in living instead of just surviving.

Thoughts like this filled my mind as I pulled off the highway on the last stop of a very long drive home. I'd been alone in the car all day, with lots of time to think about what matters, what doesn't, and how I need to spend more time focused on the former rather than the latter. It had been a good day, one that'll stick in my mind for a while yet.

So when the highway rest stop loomed in the windshield, I lingered a bit in the parking lot as the light slowly faded, hoping to seal the memory of the day a little more concretely. I wondered how often I get to just have a few quiet moments to take artsy pictures of rental cars in strange places, how often I get to put the planet on hold so I can take it all in for a bit. Not nearly often enough, came the quiet answer.

I thought of the line from the classic teen flick, Ferris Bueller's Day Off: "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Somehow, it fit.

Your turn: Do you stop and look around once in a while? Do tell...