The sun will come out, tomorrow..

Why is it that a bad day can turn into a bad week, and then into a bad couple of months? Is this a chain reaction from a negativity-focused mindset, or is it really that bad? A positive is that after bad incidents occur, there is a lesson to be learned, which puts me one-step ahead of who I was last week. Seems like only last week that my dog locked herself inside my car while I was pumping gas. When you have to give up nice things, like your brand new Jeep that has a keyless start, you forget that your used Nissan Versa hatchback has only one key that is still locked in, staring devilishly from the ignition. This is how I discovered the advantages of AAA about one incident too late. Just when you think you have everything figured out, you’re watching $70 float away as some chump pulls up an hour later and unlocks your car in about 5 seconds. The piling effect just proves to be true, as your bank account had less than $10 until tomorrow to eat and your goal of a five buck Lil Creaser’s pizza has been demolished because now they are closed. Now $60 in the hole, hungry, and angry at the dog I think, “How can this get any worse?”.

You feel that bad day set in and you wake to the blazing sun rising over the horizon. Ah a new day…BOOM! A week later, the ceiling in my house comes literally falling into my living room and kitchen. I am forced to move out, with no money and a fraction of a deposit because “the kitchen was not cleaned”. On the bright side, I think maybe I will move in with family, save up a bunch of money and get into a more affordable place. Suddenly, the news screams that a hurricane is coming. I have to evacuate the state, in hopes that my dog and I can make it through with the shortage of gas. Looking on the bright side, I do have a fuel-efficient car now, and at least I have learned to pull the keys out of the car when I am at the pump. Something inside of my head is now trained like B. F. Skinner’s operant behavior studies. Leave the key in the car, you do not eat. Take the key out, you eat. My theory seemed cheaper then AAA.

Escaping the hurricane in one piece to hang out with your family on a camping trip doesn’t seem too bad. Again, the ups and the downs. The positives and the negatives. The morning after a devastating natural disaster, I am asked to travel back home to go to work or I will eat through all of my vacation time. Feeling rather homeless, I come to my family’s house to find that they are one of the 300,000 left of 1 million without power. So, I spend 5 days fighting the heat, cleaning debris, and sitting in my car to charge my high maintenance phone that dies twice a day. Making it impossible to take advantage of my new unlimited data plan.

With the power finally restored, no longer living out of my car, I can only hope that this teaches me a lesson. A couple months later, I have learned that you cannot really be too prepared for anything. Life likes to throw a big pile of steaming shit in your footsteps in hopes that you slip. Sometimes you get stinky, sometimes you don’t. When it rains, it pours, and rips trees from the Earth to knock out your power. Sometimes we all need to sit back and let the unanticipated shit hit the fan. It’s the people who do not lose their own shit during these ups and downs that will come out on top.

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