I'd swim better if I didn't feel like I was drowning...

Did you ever have one of those days? That's a silly question, of course you have. I'm having one of those days right now. Not one those good days, but one of those days! One those kinds of days where even the fact that I have to breathe seems to be an obstacle to accomplishing a task. These kinds of days hide inconspicuously among all of the other days in my life. I tend to think that they have minds and personalities of their own. They have devious minds, they wait patiently among all of the other good days and then spring themselves on you just when you've let your guard down.

These insidious days start out like every other day. The meanest ones will let you start the day up beat and thinking that although you have tons to get done, you will have plenty of time to do it. And everything has been going so smoothly up to this point that instead of waking up in a panic about all of the things that you need to get done you wake up hopeful and cheerful even. Your husband makes you coffee as soon you present your sleepy eyes, wacky hair and gawd awful morning breath, and you smile because as far as you can tell, this day is going to turn out alright.

And then...

You check the status of the text book that you ordered 3 weeks ago, for a class that you started 2 weeks ago, only to learn that the seller, with whom you have been emailing for several days, has not received or resent the errant text book. You try to take in stride, you have homework due that requires the text, but you were creative last week, you might be able to pull off another week of creativity. You tell yourself that you won't stress out, because everything is going to be okay, you'll deal.

It's okay the day is not over. There are still plenty of other goals that you can reach things that you can accomplish. You go to change the ink in the printer, which has worked perfectly except for the lack of ink, until today. You change the ink in the printer and suddenly the printer can't/won't/doesn't properly print...at all. Well, that sucks, but we can trouble shoot from the internet right?

So then you log onto the internet. Scratch that, you TRY to log onto the internet, only to find that your internet is haywire and the router has also decided that today is a good day to drop a signal...repeatedly. The modem feels the need to operate at sluggish speeds so that just when the webpage you want has loaded up, the router stops working. It's about this point that the ends of your hair begin to stand up on their own from the tension.

So then you remind yourself to breathe. You take several deep breaths and decide there are still things that I can do. So then you go to work on the printer. Which is a mistake because 3 hours and several ink smudges on your face later. You still have a useless printer with a brand new ink cartridge.

And then the implosion begins, all of the things that weren't wrong are suddenly wrong, your house is a mess, there is laundry to be done, the bathrooms need cleaning, your office needs organizing, the budget needs balancing, the bills need paying, the yard needs tending, the dog needs walking, homework deadlines are squashing up against the back of your eyes, your manuscript is getting dusty, you still need a shower, dinner needs making.....

CCRRAAAAAAK...

That's the sound of your sanity, your resolve, your courage giving under the weight of the stress.

Glug...glug..glug...

You're in the middle of a chaotic ocean and you've suddenly forgotten how to swim...heck you've forgotten how to tread water.

Sinking...

You know what's interesting about sinking slowly beneath water? It's quiet. All the noises of the world are muffled, the pressure of the water makes it impossible to hear what anyone is saying. As you sink through the water the silent chaos is a welcomed change over the noise. You start to think that maybe you don't want to come up for air, the silence is like a blanket and it doesn't matter that you can't breathe because breathing was starting to be cumbersome too.

And then sense and then a little bit of clarity and suddenly your clawing your way out of the water. Yes, you want to breathe and yes you hate this day, but this is your day, it and all of its suck belong to you, and despite all appearances there is something good in owning even the worst of days. By the time you've pulled yourself to the surface the world looks a little newer, it's still full of suck, but since its your suck you can dress it up however you want to.

I will dress my suck in laughter, because it's almost impossible to create this kind of perfect comedic timing. I will tell my suck to "SUCK IT". This devious day may still have some surprising suck to throw at me, but this is what I will say to it,

"I'm rubber you're glue, whatever you do bounces off of me and sticks to you!"

And then I will do the only thing any sane and responsible adult would do after saying something like that, I'll stick my tongue out, put my thumb to my nose and wiggle my fingers.

It's my day!

neener-neener

~M