LIfe,

Sometimes life just sucks. Rarely, I think. At least rarely for me. I know, finances are always tight, I worry too much, the house is falling down around me but the real things, the important things are good. And even some of the not so important things are really excellent, so I really shouldn't complain. My three questions by which I measure my life are all still nos.

Is anyone I know dead or dying?
Am I dying?
Are my babies hurting, really, grievously hurting?

No to all three? Then life is good.

But...there are some not so good times. This morning I got blindsided. Stabbed in the heart, metaphorically speaking. I was so hurt, and then so angry. And then - and here's where I stopped being a baby and pulled myself together - I found myself thinking "how dare they? How dare they make me feel this way?"

Big time slap in the face, that line. "Make me feel"? No one can make me feel. Yes, people can do things that can push you to a certain place, but they can't make you choose to react one way or another. You'd think I would have this lesson down pat. For years I had a Viktor Frankl quote on my desk at work:

“The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose ones attitude in any given circumstance.”

I can't even remember what made me put it there in the first place (he was a holocaust survivor, by the way, so he knew about things being taken away), but I had it memorized I read it so often. I think of it every now and then, when someone is trying to push my buttons just to get me angry or upset. And yet...there I was, once again, trying to blame someone else for my hurt feelings. Over something that not only wasn't meant to hurt, but something that most people wouldn't even care about.

So I chose. I chose to head out for my day-long date with The Girl, and not ruin it by holding on to pointless hurt. Not only because she deserved to have a day unmarked with bitterness, but because I did. And it was a good day.