I Choose to see the Opportunities

The kids went to their father’s house today at noon.

They are with him for the whole weekend.

I had a Facebook live to do for E-School, and then I was going to just chill out for a little bit.

It was a cold and rainy morning here in CT, so it was the perfect weather to stay holed up inside in front of the fire. 

Then I learned that my son’s ride to practice fell through and his father couldn’t get him there either, and since I know how important it is to him, I drove him to practice.

It started at 2:30 and it takes a half hour to get there and we had to pick up his friend, so I had to leave the house at 1:30. 

I’d be back by 3:00 and then I could sit my butt down in front of the fire. 

We got to the friend’s house and he wasn’t there.

Apparently he had decided not to go to practice.  

This was a little bit of an inconvenience in the moment, but it was a really big one because the friend’s dad was supposed to drive him home, and now he wouldn’t be there.

Now I had to wait until he was done at 4:30 and I wouldn’t get home until like 5:30.

GRRRRR.

I was pissed.

PISSED.

I started focusing on how my plans had been fucked up and now I had “lost” four hours of my day and I, I, I, I, I.

I caught myself.

Because the truth is, I could have told my son I couldn’t drive him to practice.

I had created this situation myself.

And it would be a shitty thing to do to my kid to be sighing heavily and complaining when I offered to do this for him.

It wasn’t his fault.

It was mine.

So I looked at the situation from a factual perspective. 

First of all, I was getting an unexpected hour of one-on-one time with my son on the drive to and from practice.

He actually enjoys talking to me, so this wasn’t a punishment.

This was  a gift!

Secondly, the circumstance was I had 90 minutes until I had to drive my son home.

There was a lot of traffic going the opposite way on our way down to practice, so I didn’t want to drive home after I dropped him off. I’d have to turn right back around about ten minutes after I got home.

I hadn’t brought my laptop or any work stuff because I didn’t think I’d be staying there, so I wasn’t going to get much work done (I really don’t like working from my phone. The buttons and things are too small for me).

But I do love driving and looking at houses, and I also really love old houses, and the area where my son swims has some insanely beautiful new and old homes.

So I spent the time he was swimming driving around and enjoying the beautiful scenery.

It was awesome!

And it was awesome because I decided to make it awesome.

Every day you are presented with circumstances that can be either the end of the world OR opportunities. 

I have been working my butt off to change my default from this is the end of the world to this is an opportunity.

And the hard work is really starting to seriously pay off.

Also, three days ago I made a commitment to myself to write a blog post a day for the rest of the year and I’m down to the wire today and writing this at 10:30 pm and I’m SO TIRED so I’m just hitting publish without proofreading or editing, and if there are a bunch of errors – a bunch more than usual anyway  – it’s because my eyeballs feel like they have a pound of sand in them.

And it’s also a reminder to you that shit doesn’t have to be perfect.

Done is better than perfect.

This blog post is not perfect, but it’s done, and I bet it helps at least one person out, so it’s a success and it’s also NOT perfect.

Remember that, too. 

Sometimes B- work is just fine.