Duckie

A couple weeks ago, I had a bad day. It began unpleasantly and I just knew I was in for it. I guess it all started when I couldn't find the jeans I planned to wear. I was yelling profanities at the top shelf of my closet. I was convinced it was hiding them in order to make me late for work. I envisioned Father Time standing outside my bedroom window cackling at my misfortune. The vibes I was giving off caused my dog and cat to vacate the room. I found the jeans. They were neatly folded on top of my dresser; right where I left them the night before.

Already my day was not looking promising.

Once I left the house, with three new bruises forming on various parts of my body, a watering eye from jabbing myself in the eye with my mascara wand, and a tingling in the general vicinity of my sciatic nerve; I just wanted to crawl back into bed.

I did manage to leave early enough to stop and drop something off to someone, though. If you know me at all, you know I hit snooze about seven times each morning. I rarely leave my house before the last possible minute which will enable me to arrive at work in time to clock in at exactly 8 o'clock on the dot. A morning person, I certainly am not. I began holding onto the slightest hope that at some point, my bad day would turn good.

Then I got to work, and it was all fine. I dropped all the papers I picked up at the time clock, but that's actually nothing different from any other day, I lack quite a bit of grace and poise, and I drop things and fall down a lot...it's just who I am. Once I sat down with a nice hot cup of coffee (that I managed to not spill on me or drink before it had cooled to a drinkable temperature, thus burning my tongue) I noticed that my new manicure had chipped at some point in the morning. While irksome, it wasn't anything to get upset about. It's not even comparable to a pair of misplaced jeans.

I made some irrational declaration around lunchtime that I needed to go to Burger King. You see, nobody NEEDS Burger King. Nobody. Especially me. So, feeling guilty, I decided to just run to the truck stop down the road and get a small snack and bottle of water. Plus, I needed to put gas in my car.

Of course, when I drove up to the pumps, I saw little red cards in all the card-reading slots. The next day the pumps were gone as they're doing some work down there. Either way, I couldn't get gas, and I needed gas. Fuming, I got back into my car and merged onto the interstate toward...you guessed it; Burger King. Once there, I paid ten cents more for gas than I would have at the New Lisbon Truck stop. I also got a chicken sandwich that made me regret not putting my Zantac in my purse that morning.

As I drove back to work, yelling at cars and shouting obscenities at the radio I found an overwhelming sense of foolishness coming over me. Just as quickly as it started, it melted away. With my face burning from embarrassment as I exited the interstate, I reminded myself that having to drive a few extra miles for gas isn't the end of the world...in fact, it's not even that much of an inconvenience. I reminded myself that even my worst days would be considered good days for some.

Once I returned to work, I felt almost serene. Sure, the rest of my workday was chaotic and I got stuck behind a slow-moving fuel truck on my way home; but I just turned up my radio and sang along with the music...and I enjoyed the ride.

"When you think things are bad,

When you feel sour and blue,

When you start to get mad...

You should do what I do...

Just tell yourself, Duckie,

You're really quite lucky!

Some people are much more...

Oh, ever so much more...

Oh, muchly much-much more

unlucky than you!"

~Dr. Seuss