I was gushing to my husband on the subway Saturday night: “This was one of the best days of my life!” This is not the first time I’ve said something similar. I would be embarrassed by such a display of superlatives, except I really felt it. It sounds like something a child would say, but for me to have a day like this when I was a child would have taken something spectacular like going to Disneyland. Now, it requires only a short series of sparkling events.

Here’s what happened Saturday:

I was dog-sitting Aspen (you know that if you read the last blog: she’s my daughter’s 15-year-old rescue dog), and we went to the top edge of Central Park, 110th St. It was cold but the ducks didn’t seem to mind and neither did Aspen. I was so happy to be with her and so grateful that her cancer is in remission and she was up for walking in the park.

Then I went to my regular Saturday a.m. writers’ group. I love these people. They remind me that writing for a living is still something a great many of us can do and are doing. They reflect back to me that I am living my dream and that there’s enough of that dream to go around. Then I had lunch with two colleagues in a cute little Greenwich Village vegetarian cafe called S’nice. I’d never been there before. I felt like Christopher Columbus, discovering something other people already knew about but it was a first to me.

After that, William met me and we walked a very long way — except that in New York nothing seems far — to MooShoes on the Lower East Side for William to buy a non-leather belt. I waited for him and leafed through a copy of VegNews magazine on the counter and saw to my surprise that the publisher, Joseph Donnelly, had included me in a story about his top 10 favorite vegetarian authors. Oh, my gosh! I was so excited I told William and the woman behind the counter. I wanted to jump and twirl like Aspen does when she knows we’re going for a walk.

Since we were in the neighborhood (more or less), we went to Organic Avenue, a shop (brick-and-mortar and online) offering “tactical support for a naturalist lifestyle” and carrying the protein powder I like (Raw Power—hemp, Brazil nut, maca). I met the owner (I think he’s the owner) and his two dogs, Shalom and Ahimsa. Ahimsa is the Sanskrit word for non-harming, “dynamic kindness.” A good name for a dog. A good reminder for a human.

And since we were not exactly in the neighborhood but closer than we often get, we hiked to Stogo, a non-dairy ice cream place on 10th Street just west of 2nd Avenue.  I first heard of it when I was reading  a gossip magazine at a nail salon and there was a photo of Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick enjoying Stogo’s frozen treats. It seems that Ms. Segwick’s brother is the owner. Well, we went and the ice cream was amazing (I tried fudge brownie, caramel pecan, and bananas foster before settling on coconut vanilla; William is conservative: he had standard chocolate without sampling anything else), and I struck up a conversation with the proprietor. He told me about a cool new book, The Engine 2 Diet: The Texas Firefighter’s 28-day Save-Your-Life Plan that Lowers Cholesterol and Burns Away the Pounds , by Rip  Esselstyn, who motvated his whole Austin fire house in to adopt a plant-based diet. It turns out I’ve met his dad, Caldwell Esselstyn, MD, author of Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease: The   Revolutionary, Scientifically Proven, Nutriton-Based Cure—a really terrific book—when we spoke at the same conference. At that moment everything felt connected and all of a piece. It was as if every step, every “next right thing” was divinely guided—and exquisitely enjoyable.  

And on the way home, I told William what an outstanding day I’d had. He smiled and said, “I’m glad you’re happy.” He doesn’t get effusive like me, and he gets a kick out of it when I do. But however any of us expresses our appreciation of life, of a day, of a little gift that crops up from out of the proverbial blue, it seems to me that the very foundation of a charmed life is noticing what’s wonderful. It’s far better to have some little pleasantry and know that you had it than win the lottery and an Oscar and never realize they were being held for you.

So, my life-coaching advice after my delicious day is: pay attention. You miss the great stuff if you’re lost in worry or regret or working so hard you can’t see the wonders. Just look up now and then (I’m telling you and telling myself) and realize that Life is trying like the dickens to lavish you with lovely moments. Abraham Maslow said that as we progress toward self-actualization, “peak experiences” happen more and more. Notice them. Relish them. Expect them. Sometimes they come in coconut vanilla