Ebb and Flow

I started a post earlier today so I could whine about not getting sleep and having a spouse who doesn't (ever) get sleep. It was going to be self-pitying and extremely dull, and I put off writing it because I knew it would be.

Then Tim and I went to BYU to do our taxes. Not where you'd necessarily think to find a miracle, but there it was. Thanks to the magical program that calculates your taxes for you, we owed way less than we had anticipated, which was awesome in and of itself. But the best part? With the money we had saved up in anticipation of taxes, we had enough to get rid of one of our car repair bills that has been hanging around for a couple months. Glory hallelujah! What an incredible feeling to watch that "amount owed" number drop to zero!

I went to work after that on a high, energized and enthusiastic about life once again. By the time I returned home, I had fallen back to my previous pathetic mood. I had swung from "best day ever!" to "uggghhhh." Yes, it was a long day involving three separate jobs and driving on the freeway and thinking about unpleasant things, but it also involved spending time with my husband in the middle of the day and getting really good news about our taxes.

One of the women whose blog I follow writes a lot about ebb and flow, the exchange of good and bad, productive and lazy, chaotic and controlled. Not until today did I recognize what she meant in my own life. My day ebbed and flowed and I have to say, I did not endure the ebb part very well. I let it pull me down and drag me under, which was made apparent to me after I found myself riding the flow. I sometimes wish for more "flow" days in life, but facts are, I can't escape the other days and moments. I'd be so much happier if I could still enjoy those days, or at least not become a dull, whiny, conversation-less being.

So here's the flow that lifts us up and speckles our days with happiness, and here's the to the ebb that fills in the spaces between and challenges us. And here's to small miracles in the form of taxes that pay your bills.