Life's a [Fill in the Blank]

I’m having an internal battle with my positive-thinking side and my life-is-hard-and-then-you-die side.

I’ve always envied natural optimists. (My 4-y.o. is one.) People whose default setting is happy, and who shake off setbacks and disappointments easier than the rest of us. People who embody the phrase “Don’t sweat the small stuff -- and it’s all small stuff.”

But try as I might -- and I do try – certain experiences just knock me off my shiny happy track. And then I veer over to the dark side. The “nobody said life was fair” and “life is full of disappointments” side. I don’t like it over there. Even though there’s lots of company.

I almost think that I’m succeeding at developing a sunny outlook because when they do come, disappointments are so much more disappointing these days. I guess if I was truly beaten down I’d just shrug and sigh, “Of course it didn’t work out. Again.”

I recently had a major work-related setback. A golden opportunity came floating down from heaven on angel’s wings. The stars aligned and pointed me toward my destiny at the exact moment I needed it most. Opportunity came knocking when I was showered, dressed, and my house was clean. Choose your own mixed metaphor.

And then, after loads of effort and phone calls and late nights and “finally my ship has come in” thoughts, it all fell through. Boom. Just like that, my ship sailed off into the star-crossed night and the angels lost their wings. (Sorry, I don’t know what’s going on with me today. Too many Christmas stories?)

I was devastated. I cried, I felt sorry for myself, I drank a lot of wine, and nothing anybody said made any difference. Interestingly, this is the same way my son reacted when a playdate he was really looking forward to was cancelled at the last minute because the other kid got sick. (Only substitute juice boxes for wine.)

It was awful to see my baby like that. He sobbed big, fat tears. He wailed and bemoaned the unfairness of it all. He was powerless to change things. His day was ruined. And there was nothing I could do or say to change it. Even though I knew that it wasn’t the end of the world, that we could reschedule the playdate, that we could find something else fun to distract him, I could see that for my son, it really did feel like the end of the world.

I know you’re probably thinking I’m going to end with a lesson here. Some sage advice about how I learned to take life’s hits in stride because of my son. But I’m not. I’m just going to say that, yes, sometimes life sucks. You don’t always get what you want. You can’t smile and force the world to smile with you at all times. A window doesn’t always open when a door closes. (Or whatever the heck’s the metaphor I’m mangling.)

So I’ll just say that it’s a lot easier to get past life’s disappointments when you have someone to hug and snuggle up with on the couch. So that’s what we did, my babies and me. And I thought maybe there’s someplace in between “life is a cabaret” and “life sucks.” Or maybe I should just leave the sayings alone. :)

READ O’ THE WEEK: Oh, jeez. Maybe it’s the time of year? I looked back in my archives and found this post I wrote almost a year ago to the day: “In All Honesty…” (On the upside, our tree didn’t fall down this year… yet.)