Perspective

Today started as one of those days when everything is just a little off. It was raining, which makes loading up the car with kids, backpacks, briefcase and all of the supplies I'd bought for work over the weekend just a little more of a hassle. It was one of those days when my troubles were in the forefront of my mind instead of in the back where I usually try with all my being to push them - all of the difficulties of the work/school week, the whole mess with having to escort S into school, and spending the first couple of hours at work fielding (or dodging) phone calls from vendors and creditors wanting to know when they could expect their money. Kristy and I have built our house on risk and it's as wobbly as if it were a house of cards. We've made some decisions that may seem less than sound to others, but we made them together and knew what we were getting into. But this doesn't keep me from lying awake at night worrying, or waking in the morning afraid somebody is going to come and start taking our things away from us.

This is what plagues me during my daily routine - finances, work, kids and their schoolwork and social skills and general development. There was some of all of that swimming around my rain-soaked head this morning, and then a nice man came into the store with a question about a pipe someone sent him. A friend of his sent him this gift to help him relax while he's here with his son who's at St. Jude Children's Hospital here in Memphis. And suddenly I didn't really have any problems. This man and his situation made my burdens seem insignificant. I know that if things should take a turn for the worse - if my worse fears (unfounded, sure, but fears nontheless) should come true and this whole gamble doesn't work out and we end up living with my sister and her husband (look out, Elizabeth!) that it would be uncomfortable for a while. But we wouldn't be living at Target House or the Ronald McDonald House while our kids went through a hell we couldn't understand. We'd be together and our kids would be able to run and laugh and I wish that for this man and his family. I wished it all day as the rain progressed and the business slowed. I wished that his son - and I have no clue what is wrong with him - would get better because, for a little while anyway, it was all I had to think about.