Reddish Musings

Life seems to gang up on people. I'm not arrogant enough to think the entire world and the cosmos are out to get me, but I can make a case, perhaps a convincing one, that the world and the cosmos are out to get all of us... sometimes, anyway.

See, things go pretty smoothly for a while.

Then one day, you wake up. You get out of bed, and you lean down to pick up something, and you hit your head on your nightstand.

Ouch, but you continue. You wander into the bathroom, but your turn is just a few degrees too sharp, your toe runs right into the frame of the door. More ouch. You start wondering if maybe you should go back to bed. But, that's really not an option and there's stuff to do, so you keep going.

Dressing goes okay, except you find out that your bra (or, I dunno, boxers or something) has a broken clasp or the underwire is twisted or poking out, or something. Whatever, you pad it with a bandaid and move on.

From then on, it's anybody's guess what could happen. You're out of oatmeal, milk, berries, bread, anything. You get cut off and almost run into by a handicapped driver. Your class is cancelled. Your blinker in your car goes screwy. Your car won't start. Your bills come and overdraft your checking account with something you hadn't even expected.

The list goes on, and on, and on.

So why does this all have to happen in such a tight space? Why can life not wait to spread out negativity? Some would say that so many bad things in so short an amount of time could be a sign of something bad. Something you weren't supposed to do.

Others would say it's a test, that you'll be stronger for making it through.

Me? I just think life is cyclical. I don't think much of karma on a small scale. Astrology has yet to make much sense to me, except where the earth rotates in a pattern and I think life swings in a pattern, but these two orbitals don't intersect at any specific, trackable points.

Divination, psychic powers, all of that really boils down to the universal truth that life is sometimes good, but it carries with it the danger of turning on you. This causes fear in people who feel they have the right to know what life is going to throw at them next time around. It's easy to tell people they feel fearful and concerned about finances and their love life... because really, who doesn't?

But when it's happening, all I can do is sit there and tell myself, "This, too, shall pass." Because it normally does. Everything just gets so much more uncertain and stressful when the pendulum swings back to hit me in the face.

Maybe part of growing up is enjoying the swing up, but preparing for the swing back down without losing it when it happens. Not taking things for granted.

Yeah, that sounds good.

Personally, I think part of growing up is also just learning to fake being a grown up.