A summer day as a kid, flying around the neighborhood on a spider-bike with banana seat and big handlebars, outside all day until sunset. I remember the smell of the summer air and trees and grass as if it were yesterday.

I'll never be as carefree again. Not in the world as I know it now. But I cherish the memory.

I'm pretty happy now, and don't remember being happier than this - am making progress in my chosen career, have enough money to keep me going, have a lovely partner and am making my life in a new town. In a few years I'll probably have more responsibilities and worries (children etc) but with any luck I'll approach these from a happy base.

I was about as happy as I've ever been this new year's weekend. I spent that time with a girl I'd had a crush on for years, but had started seeing.

It didn't last, though. Maybe I'm just not destined to have good relationships?!?

I think my birthday in 2004 was the best day of my life. I was on my first visit to Ohio, staying in one of George's rental cabins. We'd met in person for the first time a week earlier after corresponding and talking on the phone for three years. We were still a little shy - well, I was anyway.

In the morning, I listened to BBC Radio live over the internet when Manchester United beat Millwall 3-0 in the FA Cup Final (it was Saturday afternoon in England).

Then George took me off-roading over his land in his old jeep. I think it was a bit of a test, he wanted to see if I wimped out. It was a bit hairy at times, there were some big, big hills and no roads, but I clung on for dear life and really enjoyed it.

In the evening, we got all gussied up and he took me out for dinner, to a really nice place in Lancaster.

After dinner, we went back to the farmhouse and (blush) I never went back to the rental cabin again, except to collect my stuff and bring it back to the farm.

Maybe I'm just not destined to have good relationships?!?

Nonsense! She just was a short-lived one. Take care of yourself and work on moving on from this. Keep at it; you'll learn and get better at deciding when to invest and when to say "This just wasn't it."

Happiest! Me! Okay. Probably hiking solo in the National Parks out west a few uyears ago, or sailing on the Corwith Cramer in the Gulf Coast or on Clearwater in the Hudson River. Christmases with my family. Or playing music in sessions and around campfires.

A weekend in late July of 1999; a friend and I drove up to Duluth, picked up another friend, and spent the entire weekend on Fun Patrol on the shore of Lake Superior. Camped in some places we weren't supposed to camp, consumed some substances and stared out at the moonlight on the big lake, hiked up a shallow river (like, literally wading in the river) and climbed some waterfalls. Some of that stuff I wouldn't do now, but man, I'm glad I did it then.

#2: My 30th birthday, spent in Mexico on a bike tour through the Sierra Madre with my wife. We saw cool shit, met cool people, ate good food, survived getting shaken down by Mexican cops, and hung out in a hot-spring hot tub. Good times.

Any time in my life that I've packed up for a road trip (either alone or with a friend) with no cares, no responsibilities, nothing except a date I may have to be somewhere, at some time in the future.

All the times I've been hiking in New Zealand with my two best friends.

Hmm, I think the happiest time of my life was the day I got the phone call that I was pregnant with my last child. I was delirious with shock and joy (he was an expensive, high tech kinda kid).

New Years Eve 1986. I was in love; we went out dancing; I was wearing a 1920s beaded dress that literally flew apart on the dance floor so as I spun the whole thing disintegrated and everyone cheered. I was wearing a really pretty full black slip anyway with lace and combat boots and so I just kept on dancing. Then we went and climbed some scaffolding to a roof with a bottle of champagne and sat on a roof downtown singing and drinking and making out as the sun came up. That was a golden moment but I've had quite a few of them, actually; parties I remember, just nights with my friends and then some wild adventures.

I was happy as a 17 year old living on my own in Spain, tripping my brains out and walking down a path to the sea just at sunrise. And just living there on like no money but lots of friends and lovers and fun things to do all the time. I was fearless then.

And then there's the happiness of having small children. It's a quieter happiness but babies are so lovely. And camping. I can be perfectly happy when I'm camping way out in the deep woods with the right people and the fire's burning and the sun is just going down and we're all drinking beer and somebody is playing the guitar and I'm cooking over a wood fire and the kids are playing in the river and the dogs are so overjoyed to be in the woods. That's almost perfect happiness for me.

Aw Jan!

I'm happy now. I think that is because I've worked to get the things I have. I've chosen all my blessings and problems. It feels great to run under your own steam.

Happiest times of my life were both travel-related:

Living in London and working for pennies, sharing a house with 7 crazy Irishmen (being the only girl and a Filipino Yank at that, oy vay) and in my first ever really serious relationship ... I was so poor and the happiest I'd ever been...

Convincing my twin sister and 2 Irish friends to join me on a week-long white-water rafting trip down the Grand Canyon. Sharing sheer beauty and sheer terror all wrapped up in one and being with people I loved. Even after having been to 60+ countries and all 7 continents, I'd still say that was one of the best weeks of my life.

hmm... actually, I'll refine. General happiness - now. Specific moments - well, there have been times sharing food and wine and conversation with friends, and playing music with friends (often but not always the same friends) when I have been very happy/euphoric, but I envisage there being more such moments, so wouldn't identify one as being my happiest. I'm generally happy that I get the chance to do such things.

in my personal experience childhood was vastly overrated. but then i'm an only child of a broken home so i spent vast lonely tracts of time entertaining myself as a kid. that and i was a social outcast in school.

i'd definitely have to say the happiest time of my life is right now.

well said halo, same for me

Wow! intensely happy moments that I knew would stay with me forever... there are so many! OK excepting the private ones,
ice-climbing some peaks in Leon in winter and being able to see the Bay of Biscay from the top.
Celebrating a birthday with the family looking down on the Acropolis as the sun set from Lykabetos hill.
The exhilariation of having both my babies in the way I wanted, what a kick!
Pulling off a hugely important business thing in Taiwan.
Right now, finishing these last horrible, awful weeks of 14-16 hour days and knowing I am facing 2 weeks in Spain, the place I feel most at home, knowing that yet again people will ask "You're from the Basque Country aren't you?", and I'll smile and say cryptically, "no, from a bit North of there actually!"
I am currently giddy with happiness! Hugs to everyone!!

I like alto's breakdown:

General happiness, definitely right now. I actually just had a meeting with my academic advisor in which I confessed to be freaking out because I'm doing so much, but everything was just falling into place so easily that it feels almost effortless. I said I'm worried that I should be pushing myself more, that I'm somehow settling. "You should just wake up every morning and show gratitude," she said.

It's sometimes awesome having a therapist as an advisor.

Really, it's amazing. New job that I love. New apartment that I love. Boyfriend who I love. School's fairly "eh" a great deal of the time, but I'm still so excited and committed to the end result, and engaged with the subject matter. I get to start an internship in the fall that I'm really excited about, and which should be both challenging and reasonably ok to fit into my schedule. Well-paying freelance jobs keep falling in my lap.

My therapist actually sent me home halfway through my last session because I had nothing to say except, "I'm really happy."

Discrete moments: A party the night after I finished my last college final, which combined a sense of huge accomplishment with a sense of huge possibility. Walking through the streets of Venice with my tourists, feeling like an utterly cool, utterly sophisticated expat who could therefore make a total goof of herself for the tourists' education and amusement. Lying in a hammock at my favorite B&B in Sonoma (which may really be my favorite place in the world) in 114-degree heat, with a wonderful book, watching the bees and the hummingbirds buzz around the Spanish-moss-covered trees. Many many many dinners with ikkyu, somewhere around the appetizer course, when the wine and the food and the candlelight and the conversation all combine in just the right way. Petting my cat this morning as she did her biiiiiiiig morning full-body stretch.

(What a wonderful thread!)

What happy news, occhiblu. Enjoy your blessings! Congratulations on doing what it took to get here today.

I'm insanely happy now! And except for several painful stuck spots working for intense micromanagers, I've pretty much had a blast all my life. Thankfully I've learned to recognize psychos and micros at first glance from all that. Overall, I've been especially happy when I'm making things like parade costumes, furniture, paintings, or dinner concoctions.

There have been moments that have been happier, but overall, I'm happiest now.

Well, as far as sustained happiness, probably over this summer with my girlfriend.

And, like I mentioned when Jon came up, I'm not good at ranking things.
But here's a happy memory— New Years Eve about six years ago, my girlfriend and I had eaten a handful of mushrooms and taken MDMA. We ditched out of a party and had absolutely marathon sex.
That was pretty good.

Sigh.

Beyond that, I'm pretty darn happy with myself and my life in general.

Happiness is like cherry blossoms, lovely and ephemeral, something you can predict will arrive but doesn't always bloom at the right time, and there's no guarantee rain won't strip the petals from the trees, though a lawn of pink confetti under dark skies and knotted branches is a sight to behold. We were sitting on a towel and a bench in Ueno park, above Shinobazu Pond, in a hall of bare cherry trees; the stones and moss and pebbles up the slope to Kannon were bright greens and dark greys barely peeking from a carpet of pink, and the rain had ebbed to a mist that caught on our eyelashes and made the three of us look like film stars in soft focus. I remember saying something silly, as I do from time to time, and Grace reached up and covered my lips with her tiny hand, rolling her big eyes as if to say, "This man! Won't he ever just hush?" I feel her little fingers on my lips now, and I feel the rain in my eyes, too.

I know I can't control happiness, and that sadness isn't such a bad thing, either. I think I was my happiest then, but aside from leaving a memory that both fills and empties me, it doesn't matter, really: I don't see happiness as a goal, and sadness isn't something to fear. They are both part of life. What I strive for is satisfaction, a feeling that whether things are good or bad, I'm living truly, and gratefully. It's not a road I would have chosen, but then, neither is life itself. This year I've felt great gratitude and satisfaction, and I feel like that is enough for now.

I'm sorry if this is too much.

I have had very happy times in the past, but I can honestly say this time in my life has been the most consistently happy, for the longest period. I had great times I will never forget - the births of my kids, trips, friends, my 33rd birthday party (luau theme) celebrated in the steady rain. I look forward to more good times, too, since now I like myself and who I've become more as I've gotten older. I've got a great husband, four interesting kids, a home of my own, and priceless friends and family. I'm rich.

In Ireland, England, Paris--my stepuncle's two houses in Santa Barbara (even though we don't quite click with each other) and my other's space are where I've felt most content.

I've been pretty ludicrously happy and content lately. Downright happy-go-lucky. I think just wish I had someone suitably likeminded and weird enough to share it with.