Back to today. This week in my little city of Springville, UT, we are celebrating our city's founding with a week long of activities, events, movies under the stars, the carnival and so on. We've been here for five years and we always make a point to go enjoy it together as a family. But I've been really busy this week trying to prep for a yard sale I'm doing to help out my in-laws which has left me little time to enjoy the festivities. So yesterday I decided that I was going to go to at least one event during this week: the hot air balloon festival. And it just so happens that it starts at 6am. I asked my daughter (age 4.5) if she wanted to go and she was really excited regardless of the early wake up time. I thought it would be a good opportunity for some mother-daughter bonding time.
"6 o'clock already, I was just in the middle of a dream..."
And then I dragged my tired butt out of bed, pulled on some clothes and gently woke up my daughter. "Hey, sis, it's time to get up to go see the hot air balloons." As soon as this registered, she popped out of bed and whispered, "Thank you mommy for waking me up to see the balloons!" If only I could have that kind of energy when I woke up. We hopped in the car, drove to the local grocery store, picked up some donuts and juice and headed over to the elementary school where the event was being held. Luckily, we found some friends we didn't know were going to be there and sat next to them.
It was fun to do something, just me and her, and not have to worry about my son running away or trying to eat someone else's food. The balloons were big and colorful and my daughter loved it. "Look, mom, that balloon is bigger than our house!" Sadly, we had to go back home before any of them took off so my husband could go to work and I could resume mom-of-two duties.
During breakfast, I was putting a little photo collage together of the morning, when something happened and I dropped my phone on the floor, maybe two feet from the ground. I didn't think anything of it as it happened because, seriously, who hasn't done this or had their kids do it a million times. But when I looked at the screen, half of it was black. My stomach dropped and I turned the screen on and off a couple of times to be sure of what I was seeing. The screen was definitely not responsive in the black area. I shut it down and restarted. If anything, it actually made the screen look worse.
I let my husband know and he started into problem solving mode. He found a deal on the same phone but the current model through the dealer, which was about 1/2 the price of going through our carrier. The only problem: it's not going to be here for 10 days. I placed the order.
I'm a little embarrassed to say it, but I cried. My kids were concerned and asking what's wrong and how lame does it sound to say that I was crying because my phone was broken and I was going to be without one for a week and a half? I also cried because I have been hoping to upgrade my computer to one that's a little nicer and faster, but now that's going to be put on hold since the money is going to a replacement handheld computer. Again, how lame must that sound to a child? And how confusing. We try to teach them that STUFF doesn't matter. That PEOPLE matter. That the TIME we spend with others making MEMORIES is what's important. And I'm over here crying about my phone.
I've been thinking all day: what am I supposed to learn from this? How can I turn this into a positive thing instead of being ticked off that I'm essentially back to the 90's when all we had was a home phone? (And actually this kind of feels worse because I don't even have a home phone...) What in the world am I supposed to learn? It's been six hours since it happened and I still haven't figured it out.
So here's to trying to figure out life's lessons. To putting into practice what I preach. And to figuring out how to make the best of a really frustrating situation. Wish me luck my friends. For the next 10 days, I'm going to need it.
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