A Hundred Years

Ever feel like you have lived a hundred years?  Well, don't... unless you have talked to someone that is a hundred and you can compare notes!  I'm guessing, if you tell a person that is a hundred, that you feel a hundred, they will take their arthritis hands and choke you!  Believe me, arthritis can give some people killer grip!  

I at times feel a hundred.  I'm sure you can relate.  You wake up, you just aren't feeling the day, you can't get into the rhythm of things, everything seems to be a misstep, off, or a stone you are trying to skip over the waters and it just sinks.  Yeah, I figured, you know exactly what I mean. When these days are happening upon me (and they happen upon me much too frequently than I'd like to admit), I feel like I am being tested for a reason.  Sometimes at the end of those days, I am disappointed because I expected a random gold star sticker to come out of nowhere, for getting through the day!  

I know, I shouldn't look for that gold star sticker as if it will be handed to me.  I need to make my own gold star!  There is a reason why you and I have these days, and there is a lesson to be learned from them.  It's whether we allow ourselves to learn from them, or just brush it off as just another day that makes it or breaks it.   Brushing it off, causes many more days in our lives that will be just like those days, on top of the many other days that will be  just as frustrating but in different ways.  

I can checklist a day if I really look into it and figure out why I had it.  Break the chains of the vicious cycle.  I don't have to feel like that hamster running in the wheel, not going anywhere and ending up in the exact same place.  I try my best to figure out why I had such a strange day, is there an obvious pattern and if so, what to do to stop it so I don't scream in my pillow over it.  I've gotten better!  It doesn't take 20 similar occurrences to knock some sense into me. I can usually see it by the second time and do the "Whoa, Nelly!" and do the "POW POW POW" putting a cap on that bad ass.  Man, what a rush when I recognize and take action!  Yeah, sometimes just reaching for that pint of Ben and Jerry's and watching sappy movies seems much simpler than attacking the 'demons'.  But it is much easier to attack the demons when they are not budging from the lactose coma I would have put it through.  Then I will have that pint of icecream...that's my gold star!

The Cop Behind You

But officer, it was an emergency...I needed icecream!!

There was a comedian that told a joke about being on the cell phone while driving when a police car pulls up next to him. He instantly drops his phone and says very loudly through clenched teeth, " I have to call you back later! "

And I had to laugh, I have done that one too many times! I even went as far as not even saying anything, so the person on the other end is sitting there not sure if I suddenly got in a hostile environment and could not talk, or if I just decided they were not worthy to speak another word to anymore.

Or if you see a cop pull up behind you, your heart rate rises slightly and you suddenly get a slight nervousness that he will find a reason to pull you over. Or that you have a warrant out there you have no idea about. No matter how good of a person you are, seeing the cop car near you makes you behave like a wanted fugitive. If you didn't have your seat belt on (shame on you!) and they pull up, you keep your body stiff as a board while you sneak your left hand over to slowly pull on the seat belt and very slowly latch it into the buckle, because if you make any upper body movement you will give yourself away.

How about when you are driving and actually not speeding at all, but you see the police car and slow down a little even though there was no law broken. I am now at the point that if the police is driving slower than the speed limit (yes, there are the very few), I will pass them. I am not being cocky. I'm just letting them know, hey, I am not dyslexic, I read the signs and I know how fast I am allowed to go. You don't set the pace for me. The white board with black print does!

I would never make eye contact with them before. We all know we pretend we don't see them when they are right next to us or behind us, because we always drive like the law abiding citizens (lol) whether they are there or not. (Even more LOL)

I do now, I'll even give a little smile. Because after all, they are people too! And maybe they like to be car stalked a little from time to time just like the rest of us!