When my husband and I first dated, I told him about a marvelous peach blueberry pie that I had baked after I graduated from college. I had used a recipe from the food section of the local paper, but had long ago misplaced the clipping. He loves both peaches and blueberries and told me it sounded delicious.

Unbeknownst to me, he wrote the newspaper, gave them the approximate date of the recipe, and asked if someone could find it in the archives and send him a copy. This was in 1986, so there were no quick internet searches or ways to simply send him a link. Instead, the food editor actually searched, found the old recipe, and typed it out on a piece of paper which she sent to my husband.

Yesterday, during one of the few days each summer when you can find both peaches and blueberries at their peak(the fruit was local, but our own blueberries were gone so I purchased others), I baked that same peach blueberry pie. I had to quickly take a picture of it since, gleeful that he could have a hot piece of pie, my husband quickly ate one quarter of it.

I smile each time I take out that tattered typed copy of the recipe, remembering the effort it took both him and the editor to deliver it back into my hands. A lovely end to summer.

Here in the summer of 1948 my 18 year old Aunt Cary holds me in the hammock at my grandparents’ farm in the country. It is a simple moment, no celebration going on, no one’s birthday or anniversary, no party clothes, no fireworks or lavish food spread. It is, in fact, the kind of moment that makes up most of our lives.

In her book “Radical Gratitude,” Mary Jo Leddy doesn’t suggest that we need to be content about every aspect of our lives. We can want to live in a safe neighborhood, with adequate food and shelter. We can want to feel better when we are ill. We can find fault with the people around us and with ourselves. But her main point is that we are missing the moment by moment chances to be grateful. For life. For family. For friends. For the sunshine. For the earth under our feet. Being alive is, after all, a rare gift, one often overlooked in our quest for more, better and different.

In a summer seventy years later, I am grateful for my aunt taking the time to just sit on the hammock with me. I have missed her every year since she took her life in 1969. She lost her struggle with a later onset mental illness. But for that afternoon we shared the joy of each others’ company. And I am glad we did.