Perspective (again)

I was walking to work yesterday when I saw the ROTC folks doing their morning run.  Yesterday was pack and boots day.  I could almost feel the weight of that pack and my feet ached for them stomping in those boots.  I watched them pass as I waited to cross the street, and I heard a friend's voice in my ear, "you think you've got it hard..."

He was a teacher at my high school, but he was never my teacher, so he was a friend.  And he was a friend... I house sat for him one summer and he came to my wedding... though I haven't talked to him in many, many years, he will always be a friend because he saved my life once.  That's another story... just to say, though, that he knew me.

He taught me perspective in his own way ... he gifted me a copy of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle with an inscription that admonished me to gain perspective when I felt like life was closing in on me.

It was an important and loving lesson.  I guess he was my teacher after all.

So, yesterday morning as I walked to work feeling so exhausted that all the muscles in my body ached as though I had been working out every morning as my schedule suggests, I could hear that voice loud and clear.

I bucked up ... went to work, determined to have a good day.

It was not a good day ... Alexander and I could compare notes ... and write a new book.

But, I did my best to remember that no matter how bad it felt, there were others who had it much worse.  I focused on the fact that I was not running in full military uniform with a fifty pound pack on my back in combat boots.

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I don't usually write blog posts live... I usually write them and post them up one or two days ahead, sometimes more... but the post I had scheduled for today could keep.

I was contemplating how to tell you about my day, and then I read this, and then I heard this.  These stories, little gifts from the universe, reminded me that everything is as it is... so I decided to include them here.

Andrea's message about the gift of the day reminded me that we are all always struggling for perspective ... and the way that can help us to be HAPPY.

The other is heartbreaking and raw and honest and lovely for all of that.  Hopefully, it will also remind us to live through it all -- to not shy away from the hard feelings or the experiences that mark us with sorrow and pain as much as they leave us with love and warmth.

Happy Friday ... we are in this together.