So You Had a Bad Day

Things were going well. A little tooooo well. I started saying (ok, typing) things out loud like, "I am ridiculously happy" and "things are really coming together" and "ain't gonna let the elevator bring us down" -- ok, that last one was The Artist Formerly Known as Prince, but you get the idea. I was walking on sunshine,  I got up and nothing got me down, baby I was a star. Apparently I had also time traveled to the early 80's, but that's ok. That's better than ok. That's awesome. That's TOTALLY awesome. We wore great colors then. And those shoulder pads really balanced out wide hips.

Yep, things were going very well indeed.

Things going well is one thing.

Saying it out loud is another.

I acknowledged the good and sent my gratefulness out into the cosmos. Thank you world. Life is good and I am lucky. I'm lucky, you're lucky we're all lucky. Thank you.

It's like the world heard that as a wake up call - wait! - did she just call me a slacker?

Within 24 hours my vacation was cut short by a day and my feelings were ridiculously hurt by the circumstances surrounding it, I tripped and fell HARD bruising and jarring my whole right side, there was an epic kiddle meltdown, my gmail was hacked (Some of you reading this are aware of that. Sorry again.), and I found out that I thought Tom was paying a particular bill and he thought I was and it turned out no one was and I got a not-so-friendly call about that. By the time that call came, actually, I was almost giddy from the rapid downward spiral. 

Beaten up physically and emotionally, I debated my options. Curl up on the couch and shut down, laugh like a lunatic or head-down-power-through. I opted for all of the above. I figured I deserved to climb into myself for a second or two, because - Come on! - to go from so good to so silly bad in a 24 hour period is unsettling. I don't have a lot of patience for people who live in a constant state of feeling sorry for themselves, but I do believe that sometimes we need a few moments (or hours or days - depending on the severity of the setback) to just allow ourselves to digest things. So I took a moment to internally wail, "Why me?" And then I had coffee with a friend and bitched and moaned the way you do when you're with someone who you know won't judge you. She offered validation, which was exactly what I needed. Then came the laughing. Not just because I was passing time on a school night with a friend, but at the general absurdity of the situation. The crying is a necessary step, but the laughing is where the healing begins.

Guess what?  My bruises are getting less tender, my vacation is still on -- it's just shorter by a day, the bill got paid and the computer virus -- well -- while I am still terribly sorry that I passed it along, these things happen. We survive.

I may not be back to feeling like a boss, like I'm on top of the world, like I am the champion (my friend) -- but that's an extreme anyway. I'm feeling strong and even and ready to give the world a hug again, if not quite ready to teach it to sing.