ALL IN ONE DAY

Yesterday was a bit stressful.  Our daughter and I had a contest to see exactly which of our days was worse.  I think I won but, really, who wants to win at being most stressed?

My stressful day actually began a couple weeks back when a mysterious, very wet spot appeared in our kitchen.  There was no reason for it to be there.  Uninvited, it just showed up.  As the spot grew larger, hubby tried using the shop vac.  Nope, kept getting wetter.  Faced with a challenge, out came the knife and the carpet now has a bit of damage.  Hubby checked and there was no reason for the water to be there.  It was not wet anywhere except in that ONE DARNED SPOT.  Where had the water come from?  Why did it finally dry up? 

Fast forward to yesterday.  “There is that sound again and it is louder,” I told hubby.  He turned the power off to the dishwasher.  Sound still there.  He turned off the water.  Sound gone.  That was not a good thing, so the plumber was called.  Stress #1:  there is a leak under your sink.  Our mighty plumber found the leak but could not fix it until the next day.  Stress #1 carried over into today.

Blast email anyway!  Stress #2:  My email was not working!!!  It kept asking if I wanted to send a report.  Did I want to send a report?  By day’s end, I sent dozens of reports.  I reasoned if I was having a bad day because of this email problem, someone else was going to be having trouble also.  My computer guru assured me it was not the connection between the seat and the keyboard (aka: me) and that IncrediMail was not as incredible as I previously thought.  It is still not working so stress #2 has carried over into today.

Are you wondering what else was stressful?  I had a court report to write and chose yesterday to begin it.  I love to write but writing for fun is not the same as writing a court report.  I am not an overly formal person and writing in an acceptable form for court takes me a long – very long – time.  Did Stress #3 carry over into today?  Only enough to make a couple of changes and send it on its way.

Are you still reading?  Proud of you because I have taken the long way around to make a point. 

A leak in a water pipe - THANK YOU LORD!  WE HAVE WATER IN OUR HOME.  WATER TO DRINK.  WE TURN ON THE TAP OR THE SHOWER AND IT JUST FLOWS OUT.  THANK YOU LORD!

Email that doesn’t work – THANK YOU LORD!  WE HAVE TECHNOLOGY IN OUR HOME.  WE CAN COMMUNICATE WITH PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD.  WE CAN DO BUSINESS.  WE CAN LEARN.  THANK YOU LORD!

Court reports to write – THANK YOU LORD!  YOU HAVE GIVEN ME A HEART FOR CHILDREN AND AN OPPORTUNITY TO HELP THEM.  THANK YOU LORD!

Each day we make choices.  Do I allow a small leak to destroy my day?  Do I allow an email glitch to destroy my day?  Do I allow the search for the right words destroy my day?  Or do I give thanks?  The honest answer? 

The honest answer is I did not give thanks yesterday.  In the midst of the leak, email problems and searching for the right words, I was stressed.  It was not until the leak was fixed, the email was up and working and the report written that I realized yesterday was a piece of cake.  It was not until today that I saw my blessings and gave thanks.

Now, oh, I have to call someone and get the carpet fixed.

We have carpet to fix.  THANK YOU LORD!