Perspective

Today was one of those days where life was put in perspective. Let's be real, I work in a hospital, it happens daily. But today was a little different.....

Last evening, I received a notification that "power was out" in our area. I mildly panicked, quickly tried to tidy up the house, finish laundry, power up all phones/iPods, and find candles and flashlights. I felt relieved going to bed while we still had power! Sadly, that ended around 5:15am when we woke to two screaming kids who realized that both their nightlights were out and white noise machines were silent. The house was pitch black. And silent.

After calming said screaming children, we laid in bed, checking texts/voicemails and emails hoping to find an answer to the outage, which was now throughout the neighborhood. The most we could find is that it would be a couple of hours at best before we were restored. Thankfully, we were all heading to school/work so we didn't have to sit in the dark very long.

I managed to get ready for my day (with the help of a battery powered lantern-thank you mom and dad!) and then headed to the grocery store, which I discovered was being powered by a generator, to grab coffee and donuts. After all, it was barely 6am and those kids needed breakfast...and we needed coffee! I left for work and eventually Ryan brought the kids to school. We still didn't have power.

Throughout the day, I received messages like the one below. I was frustrated and pre-occupied with worry about regaining electricity. Things buzzing in my mind included: frozen pipes, spoiled food, darkness and cold.

And then, about mid-day, I was graced with the presence of a cute little girl. She was about Lincoln's age and she made me hit the 'pause' button on my day. I listened as her adorable voice chatted away to her dreary eyed mother. Her gorgeous little bald head and slight limp in her walk pained my heart. And I realized at that point, any worry I had in my life held nothing against what that mommy was dealing with. The fact that we were on hour 5 without power no longer mattered. And just like that, my life squealed into perspective again.

I know that it can seem like I'm a pushover as a parent. But in reality, I like to think that I have life in perspective. I don't get worked up over spilled milk. I'm just grateful to have children spilling milk. I despise a messy house, but I thank my lucky stars for a family to make it messy and a job to help pay for the roof over our head. And yes, our kids drag out the bedtime routine like nobody's business. Yet I know to appreciate having the strength and ability to climb those stairs 3 times over again for "just one more good night!". So while it was incredibly inconvenient to lose power for a total of 7 hours today, it really was a minor problem in the grand scheme of things.