Keep laughing. To set your happiness level higher: keep laughing.

I'm just following up on what I wrote yesterday (really today). Remember the song from the musical, Camelot, "What Do the Simple Folk Do?" Arthur asks Guinevere and she tries to suggest something: a song? a dance? Nothing works. Dear Oscar Hammerstein; his lyrics are so simple and so wise.

What do you do?

I make lists. I love lists. Putting things on a list gives them a shape and a finite quality I can cope with. And checking them off makes me feel better, even if I have to cheat a little. (Putting things down that I've already done makes me feel I'm making progress.) Some sort of calming mantra helps, even if you don't meditate as such. Not the OM kind of mantra. I'm not into Eastern meditation, but I believe in the power of repetition. One imperative has become a mantra and some people don't even know where it comes from:

Be Still.

You'll find it in this short form on kitschy posters and T-shirts and bracelets and decals and wall-hangings. It's from the psalms (Psalm 46: 10) and the full sentence goes:

Be still, and know that I am God.

Go ahead and say it. Your thermostat just went up.

If you want to finish the thought, depending on your tolerance for worship, go ahead: "I will be exalted among the nations,/ I will be exalted in the earth.” I don't think that God belongs to any denomination.

I'll fill in the blanks later. I hope there is a lot to fill in.

I really am trying to catch up.

Here I am: I have a lot of tramlines, not the least of which is worrying about whether or not I am going to gain entry to the States tomorrow. I'm trying to rise above the current fussing and think broader thoughts. ...

Did you know, for example, that people have a baseline level of happiness? I like that. I remember reading a long time ago that some people are born sad and I joked and said that's was because they had blue genes. But it's nicer to focus on the happiness mind-set, and nicer to think that it's something like a thermostat and you could set it at a higher level.

I looked it up, of course. (Google knows everything.) And yes, you can reset your happiness thermostat. You just have to set your mind to it - I guess that's where the term mind-set comes in. The key phrase now is "mindfulness meditation." But laughing is good.

My husband always made me laugh. I never knew what he was going to say next, even after 20 years (not long enough!) with him. Once, when were all early-marrieds, the question was posed and put to everyone round the room. "Why did you marry?" Bill's answer was "For laughs."

I can still get a laugh from a quip he made, lo, these 40-some years ago. I don't mean to put him on a pedestal. It's an uncomfortable position for anyone to maintain for any length of time, or for anyone to emulate. I mean, how do you follow in the footsteps of someone on a pedestal? But he was funny and his humour somehow made everything more bearable.

I'm trying to recall it now. It helps.