The Extraordinary Hidden in Ordinary Life

What if the richest part of your day is the part you almost overlook?

I’ve begun to wonder whether a meaningful life depends less on extraordinary experiences than on our willingness to notice the ordinary ones.

Nothing extraordinary happened last evening. At least that’s what I would have said if I hadn’t been paying attention.

I watched a hidden sunset, a deer beneath the trees, a monarch butterfly resting on purple flowers, and a little Papillon who decided bedtime had arrived before I did.

I felt a cold summer wind coming in from the north to bring a thunder-and-lightning rainstorm, my favorite northern Michigan weather.

This wasn’t the kind of sunset that draws hundreds of people with phones held high. The gray, overcast sky offered no sunset at all until, out of the swirling, threatening masses of gray, orange-red fingers of light fought their way free of the clouds. A fiery orb pierced the clouds.

Next door, I caught a glimmer of brown among the green bushes of the landscape. A female deer, possibly the one that gave birth along the shore a few weeks ago, stared at me across the yard.

For one suspended moment, it was just the two of us in silent communion.

We held that quiet moment together. Then she turned and walked away with dainty steps instead of running, as though neither of us had anything to fear.

Purple butterfly bushes in my yard attract monarch butterflies, among the most beautiful butterflies, with a migration story that seems impossible for such delicate creatures.

I have always planted flowers to attract the butterflies and hummingbirds, such tiny expressions of nature, little reminders that creation is far richer than we often notice. They return to Michigan every summer.

Then there is Percy, my one-year-old Papillon. He speaks to me throughout the day but never more eloquently than when he is ready for bed, and he believes I have outstayed the day.

He settles on the carpet a few feet from me, not in his usual place under my feet and chair. He harumphs and noisily turns in circles until settling into the Papillon circle for sleep.

He stares at me through one wide-open eye as if, by staring at me loudly enough, he can will me to end my day. Most days, he wins.

As darkness settled over the lake, I realized that none of these moments would have made the evening news. They weren’t dramatic. They weren’t achievements. They were simply gifts that would have been easy to miss if I’d hurried through the evening instead of inhabiting it.

Nothing remarkable happened.

And yet it was one of the richest evenings of my week.

What if the quality of our lives depends less on what happens to us than on what we learn to notice?

You may not live where I live, but extraordinary moments surround all of us when we learn to look at ordinary life with new eyes.

A meaningful life is rarely hidden.

It’s usually overlooked in the everyday noise and to-dos that surround us.

Tomorrow, something ordinary will happen.

It may become the richest part of your day.

Only don’t overlook it.

Warmly,

Susan

Continue the Conversation

The conversation doesn’t end with these weekly essays.

Many of them begin as ordinary moments I almost overlook—a hidden sunset, an unexpected visitor, something Percy does, or a question that quietly follows me through the day.

I share many of those moments in Substack Notes, where readers often notice things I missed and add stories of their own. Some of my favorite conversations begin there.

If you’d like to join me in noticing them, I’d love to have you there.

And this week, I’d love to know:

What ordinary moment have you noticed lately that turned out to be anything but ordinary?

I’d love to hear your story in the comments.