There are brownies in my fridge. The chewy chocolate kind made with shredded *zucchini instead of eggs and milk, and having one with peppermint tea is kind of blissful. Add rain washing everything, turning it this impossible spring green, and new things everywhere budding and opening and blooming and the way cats are able to so totally relax and it gets me thinking about the difference between what we need and what we want. It makes me think that if we’re lucky enough to be breathing, to have the luxury of walking and seeing and hearing, if we have good friends, a smattering of family, an animal or two in our life, a splash of joy occasionally, work we find meaningful, a decent conversation now and then, a place to live, a comfortable chair, a change of scenery once in a while, peace, and the luxury of ordering pizza when the mood strikes… then surely we have everything we need. Anything else is a want.

And yet so often we focus on the ‘want’.

We give it our energy and time, all of which takes away from enjoying what we already have, or from doing something worthwhile, from making one tiny slice of the world a better place, rattling a cage or two, writing a letter, asking questions, demanding answers. All of which brings even more contentment.

If we have what we need, we have the power we need to be worthwhile, the ingredients for contentment, and so can turn our backs on the noise telling us to constantly want more, to be this or do that, what to buy, what to believe.

But I digress. This is really about the pleasure of brownies.

And simplicity.

Which always leads me to thinking about one of my favourite books, Alix Kates Shulman’s Drinking the Rain, in which she asks the best question:

how little do I need in order to have everything?

If you’re missing brownies in the everything, here’s a portal to bliss.

(Just add tea.)

*zucchini used in my version was locally grown last summer and frozen all winter and it worked better than fine

♥