The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World by Eric Weiner did not disappoint. For my travel memoir, I was looking for something that was not necessarily tied to a single place, but more of an adventure-hopping scenario, and GoB delivers immensely. Weiner recounts his travels to 10 different countries of varying degrees on the happy scale, from the Netherlands to miserable Moldova, attempting to define what about these countries (and their people) makes them happy or not so happy.
My favorite chapter was about Iceland. He mentions an Icelandic saying that goes, "Better to go barefoot than without a book," (p147) and I wholeheartedly agree. Iceland loves its writers and I would love to be loved by Iceland for a time. This book as a whole played once more on my wanderlust, reminded me that I should travel more soon. This time last year, I was returning from Italy, and a few years before that, Israel, and before that, Ireland (wow, my family likes I countries, huh). This year, however, the only traveling I will be doing is for roller derby--and that might end up being pretty extensive, if we end up in Sweden for Playoffs. (But let's pray that does not happen, because no one has money for that.)
I would love to travel and write about my travel. I sort of have, I wrote up my Israel trip for a friend's website but it never took off. I had aspirations of being a photojournalist once upon a time, but decided I was probably too anxious (slash not quite brave enough) for such an occupation.
What do I think about my own happiness? It has definitely skyrocketed in the past year, exponentially increased with my new relationship. My happiness is increased by my girlfriend. My happiness is increased by playing roller derby. My happiness is increased by doing the things I love to do with the people I care about. I think my happiness is connected to where I am inasmuch as I need to be in Ann Arbor for roller derby, but I do think the town itself contributes to my happiness. I like it here. Sure, I'd like a new job, to make a little bit more money, feel a bit more comfortable in my finances, but I would consider myself all around a pretty happy person. It was interesting to think about it in the terms that Weiner investigated over the course of the book, as I don't think I'd ever tried to quantify my happiness before. When all is said and done, I think I would give myself about a 7 or an 8. Always room for improvement, but pretty damn happy.
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