More Little Things?

I think that one of the things I find myself struggling with sometimes is finding the ability to stop and really appreciate the small things on a regular basis.  There will be moments when I am struck by something so simple, yet so overwhelming that I stop and say "Now this is beautiful".  Sometimes a late summer evening will be just exactly right, the right temperature, the right smell in the air, the sky just the right color and I will stop in that moment and really appreciate what I am seeing, but those moments don't happen often.  I find it difficult to stop and appreciate the small things in every day life.  Maybe it's because a lot of the time my life is going in a million directions at once, so I fail to slow down and pay attention to some of the remarkable things that are probably happening on a daily basis.  It could also be that I get so wrapped up in what has gone wrong on any given day that I forget to recognize the things that have gone right.  I just think about what I didn't accomplish, or what I didn't do as well as I would have liked.  Sometimes I can be very single minded, and very task oriented.  I always think "I can't do this until after I finish this..." and sometimes that makes me a really annoying person to be around.  It makes spontaneity a bit difficult, and if I'm interrupted in a task, or I have a timeline to follow that gets thrown off, all I can think about is what I should be doing.  That may mean that even if I'm interrupted by something fun, I can't actually let myself have fun because I keep thinking about the list I had in my head.

On one hand, this makes me super efficient in tasks.  I can scrub a bathroom top to bottom in 30 minutes, including the tub, so when we have company over it's really nice to be that efficient.  But, most of the time, it just means that I'm not paying attention to anything but my tasks.  I sometimes read blogs by people who find comfort and beauty in little mundane every day stuff.  People who actually appreciate the feel of bread dough as they knead it, or see all of the moments in a day that are filled with beauty.  They see wool socks and it's they're not just utilitarian items for keeping feet warm, they're something lovely and to be appreciated.  It's not like I'm not grateful for anything, it's just that I don't stop and see the loveliness and beauty in every day stuff.  I don't stop and smell the roses, so to speak.  Socks are socks.  They keep your feet warm.  I guess what I'm saying is that I need to figure out a way to see a sock as more than just a sock, without over romanticizing the whole thing.  I need to find more joy in the small things.