And Everything Worked Out Just Fine. The End.

It’s funny how things just keep working out for the best. It’s so cliché, right? I know. But, like stereotypes, which become stereotypes for a reason, perhaps clichés suffer from the same fate. My husband, the cynic, would question, “How do you know it’s the best? How do you know another outcome wouldn’t have been better?” Touché. 

To that, of course there is no answer. So perhaps instead of working out for the best, I’ll just say, they just seem to work out really well. They work out just fine. This is how I’m feeling about life right now. I am sitting in an interesting position where I can see how some things have been through their questionable times and now they’ve worked out for the best, wait, I mean, they’ve worked out really well, while in other areas I am squarely in the ‘I don’t know how this is working out for the best’ bit, but I have this strange calm about them, because of the ones that HAVE worked out nicely. 

The first is my daughter’s pre-school. If you don’t recall, the short story is: removed her from prior pre-school (drop-offs were bad for over a year), with the intention of going to School A or a back-up, School B. But School A didn’t work out because of an assessment Eliana refused to take part in (yes, there’s a whole crowd rooting for her, so go ahead), and we were three families away from getting into school B, which meant we had school Z, for zilch. I made a couple desperate phone calls, but several weeks before school was starting, we still didn’t know where she would be going, if any place at all. And then we got the miracle call out of the blue that there was one opening at one of the schools that we love, due to a child moving last minute. They needed a girl born between March and August. Eliana’s spot. It’s been a very successful venture – while she doesn’t love getting dropped off, she has not shed even one tear - if you only knew the stark contrast from the scenes we had before, you would understand my measure of success. She seems to really like it there – she talks highly about it and some of the other students – something we didn’t get with the last one. I have no doubt that this worked out for the best brilliantly. 

If I take step back, big-picture, for our family, I also feel things are working out rather pleasantly. Early this year, my husband was at a cross-road professionally. He had been deciding between a couple career moves. I knew which route I DIDN’T care for (one of them would have had him traveling 4-5 days a week), but was prepared to stand by him and his dreams and make whatever worked out work. Because under my current argument, had that worked out, that would have been ‘for the best’ also. I know, this kind of messes with your head. One of his paths didn’t work out – it closed down for him. I know it was a real blow to him at the time and perhaps he didn’t see it as such, but I could see that that one really was working out for the best, well, the best for me and our family, which arguably, is also the best for him right now. He is currently pursing his PhD, another life’s dream of his. I had my own set of reservations about this option, but it was my preferred of the two by default because I so didn’t want the other  to happen. One of my concerns was financial. Shortly after starting the program, there was a sizeable stock market crash and we didn’t weather it very well (he’s a finance guy so he manages all of our money). I didn’t panic, but we did cancel the travel plans we had slotted in for the rest of this year – we were going to travel for both holidays – beach at Thanksgiving and skiing for Christmas. I wasn’t wed to either trip – we are very fortunate to be able to travel a lot, so it seemed easy enough to take a break from it. What I didn’t realize was how lovely this would all feel. I have actually enjoyed trying to cut back on spending – it’s like a daily challenge to see how many deals I can get on things we need. We’ve started to discuss holiday plans and it feels really good that we are going to be here. Even with school starting and everyone ramping up activities after summer, it actually feels like we’ve dialed back our family’s pace. Our family metronome has gone from Allegro to Adagio. I didn’t know I wanted that or needed that, but it feels soooooo good. It feels like, despite the stress of financial woes (which, truthfully, are not stressful yet and I’ll get back to you on this when and if they do) and a major upheaval like my husband going back to school for 5-7 years, it feels like everything is working out for the best agreeably. 

There are also a couple areas of life that don’t feel like they are going very well. Namely, my endeavors to make money through my marketing consulting business and my desire for me to spend more time writing and potentially make money in this area as well (make money from writing, now that should be an easy nut to crack, no?). The thing is- because of the mode I am in right now, I can really see these things for the phase that they are – and that eventually, I’ll be able to say how both of these things have worked out for the best, smashingly, even if they don’t work out at all. I just have absolutely no idea what that’s going to look like right now. And that can be really frustrating. Really, really frustrating on some days. Again – I am lucky (I think) to have the luxury to have these picking-the-lint-from-the- belly-button moments about these things while I continue to earn little – not a position a lot of people have. I say “I think” because perhaps if I absolutely had to figure something out (think R.K. Rowlings who, after hitting rock bottom, turned things around with ‘her old typewriter’), then maybe I would. But I will. For now, the only thing I can do is keep on keep’n on. The rest will work out. Even if I have to find bottom first to find my way up…I then just hope I’ll have the good sense to read back on my own blog and remember….

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