When Karma makes you her bitch
Dear Universe: UNCLE!
Have you ever had one of those days where you feel like the powers that be are all conspiring against you? Where Murphy’s Law is in full effect? All the lights are red, all the railroad crossings involve freight trains, that text with the unfortunate autocorrect went to the exact wrong person, you are missing one key ingredient for every single recipe, every load of laundry has a lone sock and none of them match the other loads’ lone sock (how is that even possible?), that appointment was actually for 1pm, not 2pm and you are now rescheduled for the tenth of infinity-from-now, the one pair of cleats you donated is the only pair that actually fits anyone and the pet tortoise is either hibernating or dead – you’re afraid to find out which… well, ok, that last one may be specific to me. Anyways, I am on approximately the 137th day in a row of “that” day.
It all started innocently enough. We had wrapped up the oldest’s baseball season, the youngest’s birthday party and my final Vacation Bible School director-ship all on the same day in mid-July. Putting away my last overflowing load of laundry at the end of this day, I flippantly said, “oh good, now we can just coast through summer. I can play tennis, we can go to the pool, the parks, the lakefront, the museums… it’ll be so fun and easy!” I immediately thought, “Wait, easy? Oh no, Jinxed!” but then laughed at my own silly superstitions and promptly broke my pinky toe almost clean off by walking into the bunk bed ladder.
August was not easy… it was fun, but it was not easy. For whatever reason, karma has been toying with me ever since. I even tried to give her a shout-out on Facebook recently on a pretty good day, but she either doesn’t read Facebook or doesn’t like a suck-up, because the day after that post was one of the most sitcom-worthy pratfall days of my life.
Now even my own body is siding against me. Not only did I get a kidney stone, it appears to be the most stubborn, sluggish kidney stone in the history of kidney stones. Looking for the silver lining, I thought “Hey, I’ve just kicked up my pre-vacation diet a notch by only consuming water and saltines for a week,” but apparently writhing around in pain doesn’t burn off as many calories as you’d think.
I keep telling myself that this, too, shall pass (literally). That nothing earth shattering or life threatening has occurred and I am forever grateful for how much good fortune my family and I truly do have. If this is the universe trying to balance things out, I’ll take it. But fair warning, you don’t want to be behind me in any line or walking with me near a busy street awash in puddles. Oh, and Bob the tortoise was *not* hibernating, but that’s a story for another time.