Life Comes with Curveballs
Every single day
I have been stressing heavily about the fact that my car decided Wednesday should be the last day it functions on this earth. I don’t like change, and I don’t like feeling helpless, so when the mechanic told me the amount it would take to fix it, I wanted to crawl in a hole. I could almost buy a new car with that amount; frankly, this car isn’t worth that much.
The hubster already has a plan in place and is diligent about taking care of all the horror shows of responsibilities that come with having a family and not being independently wealthy. So . . . though the solution isn’t anyone’s favorite, it is being handled, and I don’t even have to handle it alone. This is a bonus if I’ve ever heard one. Being part of a team means you never have to shoulder anything one hundred percent. (At least, it should mean that.)
So, why did I spend all of Wednesday night and yesterday still feeling like this was the end of the world? Why is it that the rational side of me is capable of setting it aside, putting it in the slot it belongs in, but there is a crazy lady inside of me who keeps screaming that it is NOT okay?
I have been trying to shut her up ever since Wednesday with no success.
It took another curveball aimed at one of my friends, and one that packs a bigger punch, to shake me out of my stupor.
I guess a rogue ball can do the trick to knock some sense into you.
A friend of the family (we are not close, but I have known her for years, and we are close with other members of her family) was in a car accident last week. She has been in the hospital and wasn’t doing very well, but she was holding her own.
Till this morning, when the hospital called and told her family to hurry down if they wanted to be able to tell her goodbye. She lived with her mother, who had been battling cancer, and helped take care of her. She also has two teenage daughters and a four-year-old son.
And after today, they will no longer have their mom. Those kids meant the world to her, and she had to leave them. That is an actual tragedy.
If the biggest tragedy I face today is that my vehicle has died, I am totally fine with that. I would prefer to have the money to buy a new vehicle. I would also prefer that my vehicle had just kept running for the next two years. That was the goal we had for milking all the life out of it.
The news that my friend was going to die was what it took to shut up the crazy lady inside me. For the rational, grateful part of me to come to the forefront. That makes me shake my head at myself, but at least that was enough to bring me around and shut that crazy lady up.
We all have the right to be stressed out by our circumstances, even when other people have a worse situation going on. Not having a vehicle is stressful. We all deal with stressful issues, big and small things, and we have the right to be upset by them.
One person’s stresses do not eradicate someone else’s.
But it’s so very important that we all take the time to be grateful for the things that are going right as well.
So, today, I’m going to set aside my crazy lady, and I’m going to wallow in my gratitude for the fact that my children are both having a good day. They are off on a shopping excursion for Black Friday. My 18-year-old took my 11-year-old to buy her some special things, and it made the baby feel so special.
My husband is safe. My parents are safe. My sister. My nieces and nephews. All accounted for and doing okay.
Everything in my world is just fine, car or no car.
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