Thursday November 25, 2021. Thanksgiving Day.
Whenever life serves up lemons, we have a choice. Well, maybe more than one. I suppose first we have to decide whether to make the lemonade or not. Trust me: you'll want to make the lemonade. Rotting lemons are nothing anyone wants to have to handle. Even on our best days.
But once we're in the midst of extracting every precious drop of juice we can and we're well on our way to producing that full glistening thirst-quenching pitcher, we have another choice.
We can choose to see today's misfortune as the unfair punishment of a cruel and sadistic world. Or we can look for all the ways in which, really, if we think on it hard enough... in the end we must admit that every wrong turn was our own damned fault.
Can you guess which of those two tends to be my default?
Stop whining.
My original plan was to be on the road from NYC to Westport Wednesday night around 9PM. But packing a bag (or two) for 3 nights is seldom as simple a proposition as it maybe ought to be. When I finally zipped up my Tumi and went to grab the bag of fruit in the fridge I glanced at the clock on my cable box.
Needless to say, it was no longer 9 or even 10 or 11. And I would not be on the road to CT for another 5 hours due to a stupid mistake I made regarding the garage and its on-again-off-again Covid schedule.
For a New Yorker with a car and a getaway plan, the only thing worse than discovering your car is being held hostage to unanticipated garage hours is learning you've been towed to some part of New Jersey you cannot locate on a map.
I'd like to interrupt this post with a brief (but essential) Public Service Announcement:
So, you see, the roads and bridges between CT and Boston were nearly flattened by 90 mph daredevils zig-zagging in and out of bumper to bumper traffic, often using the shoulder as their own private audition for the remake of Rebel Without a Cause. (Thank Adrien Royce for that reference)
I ended up late.
Late again.
Then later still.
Now, having missed three people I very much wanted to see, I had a choice. I could wallow in the crushing defeat of it all. Or I could take it as another opportunity to exercise my muscles.
Which muscles do you mean, Roland?
My coping muscles. My living muscles. My humanoid muscles. The muscle of adapting to unpredictable and sometimes inconvenient circumstances.
Standing on my sister's front porch in the dark, her screen door between us, the only light spilling out from her front hallway, she asked me if I was sure I didn't want the use of her guest bedroom. I already had my hotels booked. And, frankly, I'd never forgive myself if somehow I unwittingly gave her CoVid. (Yes we're both vaccinated but have you heard the news from South Africa and South Korea? This ain't over, kids.) I won't say the name of the hotel I was supposed to be headed to cause why invite a lawsuit but suffice it to say she was able to call up on. her phone several postings about bedbugs, all dated 2021.
I canceled that reservation and hightailed it to Boston where I drove around and around the theatre district for 10 minutes before realizing that I the reason I couldn't find the hotel was cause when I'd lived here it had been a parking lot.
Change is inevitable. Deal with it. And in that there is no choice.
