This morning began all wrong.
I was still laying in bed at 9:17am....foggy-brained, headachey, and feeling the grouchie-grumbles coming on. I don't like it when I sleep in because I am a Carpe*-Morning type of person and savour the early hours of quiet and peace when I can do my things at my pace. And I had had all three of my alarms ready and set to go off nice and early so that I could revel in the silent solitude and accomplish some of the things on my to-do list. Armed with a giant mug of hot tea.
But then....life.
You see, yesterday, I took a van-load of kids and our dog to a local park. There was a playground, a walking path and a small skate park fully loaded with vert ramps, half or quarter pipes, bowls and stair rails for kids to skateboard, scooter, and bike on. We arrived there with one Razor scooter, one lime-green penny board, seven kids and one dog. Plus me. The kids began vigorously scootering, penny-boarding and just running up and down those ramps and bowls and pipes. It was all very Ultimate Beast-Master. They slid and skittered and scampered and rolled with the endless energy that kids have. I have to confess, I got a little inspired and jogged the dog up and down a ramp or two or five. He bounded up and catapulted down, his doggy mouth opened wide in a smile, tongue lolling. He loves doing crazy, that dog of ours. He didn't need wheels to master this skate park; he was all set with four furry paws and the exuberance of a yellow lab.
An hour later, we packed up and left.
When we tumbled out of the van and rumbled into our home a few minutes later, we were red-faced and happy. But not the dog. He limped out of the car and painfully climbed the two stairs into the house.
Uh oh, we thought.
But nothing seemed to be broken. There was no blood or swelling or oozing bodily fluids. So we decided to make him comfortable and wait for the morning.
What followed was a night of Paul or I or the kids checking our hound. He whined and whimpered and moved only when he needed to. He was obviously sore. We hand fed him treats - which he still vigourously gobbled up because he is a Lab, after all, and eating is their specialty - and brought him bowls of water to lap up. We Googled 24-hour vet emergency locations and wrote down their addresses and phone numbers, just in case. We checked on our dog at midnight and 3am and 4am and 5am and had a mini-meeting at 6am. We decided to wait a few hours yet. Paul curled onto the couch and pulled a fuzzy blanket over him. The dog saw that he was staying and stopped whimpering, laid his heavy head down and slept. I ambled upstairs and collapsed into bed until....well...9:17am.
This morning, we contacted our caring and awesome vet (#jamesschulenberg). He took the time to assess, assure, and reassure us that the dog had probably just overdone it. Labs are total Weekend Warriors, he told us, they overdo it all the time because they get caught up in all the fun.
In the meantime, Yukon had perked up, walked around the block, devoured breakfast plus all the spilled popcorn on the ground from yesterday, licked everyone's face and gone back to sleep. He's not crying or whining or whimpering any more. His movements are tentative but not pain-restricted. We think he's gonna be okay. We continue to wait and see.
In the meantime, nothing about today is going according to plan.
It's the last day of the year, and I had all sorts of ideas about what we were going to do. I'm a Carpe*-Last-Day-of-the-Year kinda person. I wanted to get some early morning work done, do some family skating, get ready for the evening's festivities and spend time reflecting on the year gone by.
But nothing seems to be going according to plan.
It's interesting; the older I get (and I am pretty dang young yet), the more I hear this sentiment: Nothing seems to be going according to plan.
My life is not where I wanted it to be.
I never thought I'd be here.
Or, in the words of the Proverbs 31 writer and speaker, Lysa TerKeurst, "It's Not Supposed to Be This Way."
Sometimes, looking back, remembrances turn into So Many Regrets.
I have them. I regret taking our dog to the skate park. I regret running him up and down ramps meant for kids with wheels. I regret ... I regret.....I regret.
How about you?
Got regrets?
I think when we look back on a year gone by, it's easy to get weighed down in the Regrets. They're heavy, consuming, and absorbing. They have a way of distracting us from the good memories. From the moment when my dog was running by my side and he slid me this deep-brown, side-long glance that said, "This is fun, isn't it?!" I love that dog! He gets my kinda fun....the kind that gets so caught up in all the fun that it hurts.
And if I don't watch out, my regrets will wash away that memory.
Unless I refuse to let them.
Today, I will remember 2018. Reflect on it. Allow myself small regrets but then refuse to let myself stay there. Regrets will not wash away the good memories. Not today.
Today, I look forward to 2019. I have lots of Resolutions. One of them includes never running my beautiful Lab over skate board ramps, like, ever again. I WILL allow my regret to be transformed into a learning experience. Good can come from regret as long as I don't wallow there or be overwhelmed by it all.
I have other Resolutions that include early morning alarms (all three of them), workout challenges, doing more, spending less, eating better, being kinder, loving harder, writing more.....and.....graciously allowing room for Reality.
If Regret looks back and Resolutions look forward, what happens with the here and the now?
This morning, I woke up at 9:17am. It wasn't what I had planned. But my head-fog and aches cleared up and I felt rested. I came downstairs to see my son taking the dog out for a walk. Yukon was not limping or whimpering. I had a leisurely coffee with my husband while the kids played happily with each other. My awesome vet assured us and my dog lovingly licked my hand.
"I'm so sorrry, buddy," I whispered against his velvety soft ears and his brown-eyes slid sideways at me awash with unconditional love. We ate breakfast at 11:45am and no one complained or whined or argued. We meditated on some beautiful Bible verses together and made plans for the night's festivities ahead. And then I began doing some writing...armed with a huge, hot mug of caffeinated coffee.
And all was good with the world.
Even if it wasn't unfolding according to my plans.
So I'm just going to sit in the here and now and Revel for a bit. Reflect on my reality which is pretty dang okay, after all. Even without my lists, three alarms, schedules and plans.
Maybe you can join me?
There's a time to Remember and even a time to Regret. There's a time for Resolutions.
But for now, let's just Rock our Reality.
Happy 2019! May God bless and keep you.
Love BV
*Carpe - from Carpe Diem which is Latin for "seize the day"
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart."
- Jeremiah 29: 11-13
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