On the way to and from church today, my mind wandered about the things that may have consumed my mother’s attention when she was my age. When she was 49, she was working as a substitute teacher in the Pulaski County Special School District, carting me from piano lessons in North Little Rock to UALR for Academy Orchestra rehearsals every Saturday, all the while trying to figure out how she could afford to pay her medical bills because they were beginning to mount because her diabetes had spawned into other conditions. Little did she know that in less than 10 years she would no longer be here.
There’s a meme of a woman who is in obvious distress on several of my friends’ timelines that says “me trying to excel in my career, maintain a social life, drink enough water, exercise, text everyone back, survive, and be happy.” Gosh, I can relate to each of those! In the here and now, those are legitimate concerns. While I don’t have children, my life is plenty complicated. But still, if that was all Mom had to handle, she might laugh at me for trying to do such things that would probably seem trivial to her.
Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to be though? Each generation should have less to worry about than the last? Without a doubt Mom would say that she prayed so hard while on this earth so her children would have a better life than she lived. She would probably have no regrets in spite of her circumstances and would encourage us to make sound personal and professional choices.
For many of you reading this, inflation might be an annoyance, but you’re most likely not wondering how you’re going to put gas in your vehicle. If you have children, you might be struggling with whether to send them to a public or private school or university, or where is the best place to buy their uniforms or how you’ll help them decorate their dorm. You have a taste for something other than what’s in your fridge and you have the means of getting it without having to make too many adjustments in other areas. Maybe you have to decide to stay stateside, or you’re going to go to Mexico instead of a locale farther out of the country. For some of us, the most difficult decision you’re going to make today is deciding to purchase that brand new SUV or save a few thousand on the 2020 version. I could go on but you get the idea. Please don’t think I’m minimizing anyone’s struggle; we are each built differently and live according to our choices.
When it hit me how blessed I am, I felt a profound sense of gratitude. I could wake up in the morning faced with a completely different set of challenges, and I hope that I would deal with them head on, just as Mom did.
For now, may the hardest decision you have to make is what color to choose for your mani/pedi.
#ksmithsays
ksmithsays 