Good days

The one thing "bad days" have over "good days," is that they're completely optional.

Last Thursday was a good day (from my perspective). Although I had to work my midnight job both Wednesday and Thursday nights, I had the morning on Thursday free to pamper myself. I found myself home alone on a beautiful 85 degree day with sun and no clouds as far as you could see. It's days like this that make me glad that I work nights, because I get to enjoy the mornings while others are cooped up in their offices doing whatever it is that "normal" people do. I was enjoying the day so much that I lost track of time and stayed up a little too late. 2pm late to be exact. That would be like 2am for those of you who exist during the day. I had opened up the house to let in some of that fresh summer air and to give the air conditioner a much needed break. I finally forced myself to lie down and get some sleep when there arose a horrifying noise from just outside my open bedroom window. It was the neighbor. He decided that it was a great day to finally rent that stump grinder and get that old dead tree stump out of his yard. I must say that it looks a lot better now. So that only took a little over an hour.

I believe that I drifted off to sleep at around 3:30ish. I had some wonderful dreams as I lay there with a warm summer breeze blowing across the room. And then around 7pm is when I was awakened from my bliss by the tornado siren. The township thought it was a good idea to place it just a block away from my house so that I would be able to hear it, in case of emergency. After hitting my alarm clock and throwing my phone across the room, I realized that this was something more. I thought about the fire alarm.... No, that's not it. Oh, it must be the first Saturday of the month and they are testing the system. No! that's not it either. What's going on?! I thought in a groggy state after only 3 1/2 hours of sleep. So I got up to look out the window at a huge black storm cloud headed my way with my name all over it.
As the wind started to blow, I saw my drunk neighbor go into his metal tool shed and pull up a bucket to sit on. Then he pulled out his cell phone to call his girlfriend. The rain started coming down sideways first from the North then the West. Then back from the North again. The maple tree in the yard ran and took cover behind the pine tree, all bent over with it's branches reaching East. The willow tree out back with it's long wispy branches, was reaching straight up into the sky, and I thought, this is not good! The hail hit the skylight like a drum and it sounded like someone was throwing rocks at the side of the house.
Pugsley and I went to the room in the center of the house and sat under the desk. It's a single story wood frame house, so there is no place to hide.
Fifteen minutes later, it was all over. The neighbor was still sitting in his tool shed (that was amazingly still there) and there was a beautiful rainbow coming out the top of it.
Power was knocked out all over the area and damage was done to many homes and businesses. The tornado touched down three miles just North/West of my house and again three miles South of my house. So it basically bounced right over head. There thankfully, was no damage done at my house or in our neighborhood.
By the end of it all, it was too late to go back to bed. So, off to work I went until 6am. After which I had a funeral to do on Friday morning. This funeral was for a very prominent woman in a nearby town. She was only 42 years old, had two teen age children and a husband that she left behind. She was a member at the local yacht club, golf club, tennis club and any other club that meant money. Cancer had devastated her life for the last two years. It turned out to be a very large service. We had over  150 cars in the procession out to the cemetery and many more people that just came for the service. We filled the parking lot, the water run-off field and two empty lots near the funeral home with cars and still had 30 more on the street. It was a wonderful service where everyone who could was able to share a memory. Out at the cemetery, we had everyone putting a rose on her casket after it was lowered into the grave. We went through hundreds of roses. We also had a releasing of doves. The husband and both children held them and released them together. It is always very touching as the bagpiper plays to watch the white doves circle the cemetery twice and then fly off. Truly a wonderful send off for a young lady who died way too early.

I was completely exhausted by the end of it. Driving that Cadillac back to the garage can be quite the task when you've had no sleep and a very exhausting two days. Thankfully, I don't work Friday nights. Once I made it home, I didn't wake up until well into Saturday. Then in the afternoon, the husband and I treated ourselves by driving out along the shore to a quiet restaurant on the bay for a very nice seafood dinner.
With all the noise and the ruckus of the previous days, it was delightful to watch the seagulls and the boats while we enjoyed  our meal.

It would have been very easy to let everything get to me and proclaim it to be a "bad day". But then I probably would not have ended up having a nice romantic, much needed, dinner in the end. It's up to us to decide how to react to everything. Getting upset and having a bad day, just doesn't get you anywhere good. So, I like to think that it was a good day(s). The stump is gone, everything has been power washed, a woman is no longer suffering and I got a really good meal.

Until next time... look on the brighter side!