The other day was one of those mornings where crawling out of bed in the morning felt like one more thing on my to-do list for the day. I trudged through the morning on auto-pilot as I mentally rearranged and tried to figure out workarounds for all the things I had to do that day (or felt I had to do may be more like it), while trying to fight off my body’s sluggishness of “I don’t want to.”
Running late (again) for my job, I stopped at the gas station (check) for a fill-up making me even later but it let me cross off yet another item on my list thereby making it a worthwhile trade-off.
Waiting in line for the next free pump I got into the head of “How am I going to do this? I’m so tired now, and what if…. And then what if…. Oh but then I have to….How am I going to this? I’m so tired…” and the wheels on the bus go round and round. You get it. As the tape looped in my head I noticed the guy in the next fuel lane, climbing around on the outside the cab of his 18-wheeler truck banging each window and swinging himself like a monkey from the driver’s side, (bang, bang, bang), to the back window (pull, bang, bang, pull), to the passenger side (bang, pull, yank on the handle), back to the driver’s side (bang, pull, yank, sigh).
I became mesmerized as I watched him and feeling cold for him as he was out there in just a sweatshirt and seeing his breath as he exhaled from each exertion and frustration. HE LOCKED HIS KEYS IN THE CAB AND IT WAS 9 DEGREES OUT. Oh my! I felt so badly for him when I realized this. Once I understood what was going on and watched him motion for the gas station attendant for some sort of wire hanger, all of my “to-do” stuff came right into perspective. No matter how many things I had to do that day or how late I was running, I gave one final glance to the truck driver as I drove away, silently wishing him luck, and realized that things could be a whole lot worse! Perspective my friends, it’s all about perspective. Sometimes it takes another person’s misfortune’s to make us realize this.
Now when I find myself getting overwhelmed again, I remember that poor truck driver and suddenly my to-do list doesn’t seem so bad. Things could always be worse!