Finding the Bright Side by Konnie Enos

On my wall by our front door we have a large calendar. One of those erasable reusable things that we can write a month’s worth of dates on and fill in with our families appointments.

My youngest daughter has an artistic side so she has taken to decorating it as she sets it up each month. This month her sister helped her, so rather than draw relevant pictures for the season, they wrote words.

I walked in one day to find the calendar covered with words around all the usual stuff about appointments. Words like wir danken schon, gracias, and merci. I’m not sure where they found all the words, but they are in several different languages.

It gave me a moment to pause, think.

Do we really focus on what we are thankful for in this season?

My sister has been going through some really tough times the last several months including her car getting totaled.

But with everything that is happening there are still things to be thankful for.

I even have things to be thankful for even when I can’t get everything done that I need to because my husband only sees what he needs to do and can’t seem to realize that my to do list is twice as long as his is.

This morning for example.

He was too tired to get up and take our boys to school even though he was asleep a good three or four hours before I could even stop running kids around, let alone get some dinner and crawl in bed. And I woke him up a good half hour after I got up. Yet he was too tired so I had to drive.

It didn’t matter that he’d had more sleep or that I had a full to do list that depended on me using the time it would take to take the boys to school to do other things, like get this post up on time, rather than late.

I can, however, be grateful that I can run on only five hours of sleep. Otherwise I’d never get it all done.

I can be grateful I have a working car and a roof over my head.

I can be grateful I have daughters who at least understand how hectic my life is because clearly the men in my life seem to think I have nothing to do most of the time.

I suppose I’ll never get my husband to understand.

I came home and started typing, I was late already and my husband said something to me about getting a much needed bath, since the tub was available. After all I was yelling at him this morning about needing one.

So I yelled at him again for not listening.

Yeah, I need a bath. I also need to get my post up, among other things. My list is a whole lot longer than that, which is why I didn’t want to drive the boys to school. I didn’t have the time.

And now I’m running even later.

My post is late and I still need breakfast and that bath. Along with the rest of that list I didn’t get to because my husband was too tired after sleeping for twice as many hours as I got last night.

But hey, at least I’m still breathing.

 Smile. Make the day a brighter day.