Choices

I stood staring at the broken glass and the explosion of red, Valentino hot sauce all over my pantry floor. The jar had fallen off the shelf, and was now dripping off the walls and soaking into the tile grout. It was 6:15 a.m. and I was still in my nightgown.

I wanted to take numbers. I wanted to make someone pay for this. Who put the sauce away like that? As I stood there, to my horror, three more jars slipped off the rack and crashed to the floor. A bottle of oil, some jam and some more salsa. I turned and met Bill’s eyes, and just stared at him. I mean, can you believe this???? He waited to see what I would do.

I had a choice. I could loose my mind, start yelling and bitching, or I could simply shut my mouth and clean up the mess.

Choices. I had been making some bad ones for the last few years. My attitude and joy for life had been in need of a good jump start. The rut that I had been in for the last few years had dragged me down into a bitching, whining, helpless, negative jerk. To sum it up, I had gotten myself into a very bad habit, and habits are hard to break.

Tuesday night I found myself yelling at the AT&T switch board operator. I think I said something to the effect that if she put me on hold, I would time her and have the minutes charged on my cell phone taken from her paycheck.

Yup, what an ass.

After I had hung up the phone, Bill, having heard everything, walked by, spread his hands out gesturing to our home and such and said, “Wow. Look at all we have and all the great things that have come our way, and we are upset about the telephone.”

I went to bed thinking about my behavior. I thought about my sour attitude. My impatience. All the times back home when I had participated in gossip and ill will.

My impatience.

My anger.

My frustration.

My hurtfulness.

My hurt.

MY…bad….behavior.

With that one sentence that Bill uttered, he peeled the scales back from my eyes. Literally.

So, yesterday morning I awoke, and immediately called AT&T. I spoke with a repair specialist and he made an appointment to come fix my phone. I also asked him if he could tell me the name of the woman I had reamed. He told me and I explained to him how badly I felt. He told me that he could e-mail her a message if I would like, so I told her that there was no excuse for my bad behavior and that I was very sorry for speaking ill towards her.

I decided that morning that I had a choice. I could chose to be positive in EVERYTHING I do, or I could carry on making myself and everyone around me miserable.

So your husband throws his dirty socks on the floor? Big deal people. At least he is alive to throw them there. Think of the alternative. I have.

So your school board does something that you don’t like, and you go on bitching and moaning about it for over A YEAR. At least you have children to be concerned about.

So your yard has fungus. A least you have a yard.

So your new car has a dent in it. At least you don’t have to walk everywhere you go pushing a grocery cart with all of your belongings in it.

So your food comes to the table at the restaurant and it is not that great. At least you don’t have to pick your food out of a dumpster to feed your children.

So your child threw up on the floor. At least it is due to a virus and not from chemotherapy.

So your home phone doesn’t work…….at least you have the luxury of having a cell phone, you spoiled rotten brat.

After talking to the At&T repair dude, I loaded Mia up into the car and drove to the ocean. I needed some salt water and sand. We wandered up and down the beach looking for shells. We found a gorgeously perfect sand dollar.

God’s promises Jody….don’t ever forget.

An old lady wandered down the beach toward us and handed Mia a lovely shell, saying “Here is a beautiful shell for a beautiful little girl”.

I have a beautiful little girl to love.

I gave the lady the sand dollar.

I text messaged Bill a picture of the beach with this message “Dude, we live here! We are so blessed. I love you. Love, Jojo”

We came home sun kissed, happy, and I had a clean slate. I could do anything with it. It was my choice.

So, there I stood this morning looking at the red, oily, sticky mess on the floor. My kids were frozen. Bill had his eyes locked on mine, pleading. I wanted to explode. Instead, I smiled and cleaned it up. My kids jumped in and helped and in no time it was gone and my floors were cleaned ta boot!

I can’t live with negativity stirring me up all the time. I realized this before we even moved here. It was one of the reasons I needed to leave. I needed to make a change for the good of myself and my family.

I now need to break some bad habits.

Yesterday I made a choice.

What will you choose today?