Programming Note

I'm traveling for work this week and need a little break to recharge my batteries anyway.  So no blog this week, and I'll be taking the next couple weeks off after that to try to think of some better material.

So have a great early summer and I'll see you back here right after the week after Independence Day.

One Day

You probably came here expecting a new blog post. If so, you're slightly out of luck because I'm slightly out of ideas.

I had planned to use this space to announce that I was taking off the month of June to recharge my creative batteries.  After all, I took the whole summer off last year, so I could spin cutting it down to a month-long vacation this year as progress on my part. I could portray myself as the sacrificial hero who trades the majority of a theoretical lazy summer of drinks on pleasant patios to slave away for the benefit of the masses.  Or at least the dozens.

But there are so many people I know going through so much turmoil, that I can't help but think that there's some small chance that one of them was looking forward to the possibility of getting some encouragement, or maybe just a laugh, from this week's new post. And when you have as few readers as I do, you can't afford to alienate any of them.

So if you are one of those people who came here slightly broken, I can relate.  Truth is, I've been kind of down lately too. 

June is a hot, boring month. When there are lots of things hitting at once and nothing on the calendar to balance out the turmoil, the compilation of crap can be overwhelming.

So if you came here in need of 10 minutes of refuge from daily life then your in luck--I do too.

Sometimes I quote U2 lyrics in this space. Tonight, because I've got nothing else, I'm dropping my standards considerably and using lyrics from Christina Aguilera and Pitbull.

I'm sorry.  They (the lyrics, that is) have been stuck in my head all week.

One day when the light is glowing
I'll be in my castle golden
But until the gates are open
I just want to feel this moment.

Everyone has a "one day" floating around in their head.  It's the human condition to believe that we are just one step away from peace and happiness.  

Maybe it's that one day money won't be an issue, or that you'll find true love or that your marriage won't seem so hard.  Maybe you're not where you want to be, either geographically, physically, occupationally or relationally. Or maybe you're hoping that one day the hurt that is stinging you so much won't feel so sharp, or that you can make amends for bad choices, or that your situation, whatever it is, will have a happy ending.

One day. Somewhere over the rainbow.

Unless your number gets called tomorrow, your "one day" will probably eventually come (although maybe not in the way you were hoping), and things will get better.  And then it won't be long before your "one day" will become something else, because that's just the way we're wired. 

But in the meantime, make it a point to spend some time with someone who loves you. Give yourself permission to enjoy an irresponsible frivolous pleasure or two. Enjoy a few moments, even if you can't enjoy anything more.

Life goes wrong sometimes, and everyone's life could be better. 

But I once heard that our living life is like driving at night: our headlights only see ahead to the next curve.  But once we get through it, more often than not, we'll have just enough light to navigate the next curve as well.  And then the one after that.

Until our light is glowing, and we're in that castle golden, we just have to deal with the road one curve at a time.