Get Out of Jail Free

It’s tax season and every year we all have to file our taxes. Some of us file our taxes ourselves and others use an accountant. I personally always use Turbotax online, because it’s self explanatory, easy, and you get your money back faster. Our taxes have been filed for weeks now. What’s better than direct deposit right into your bank account?

This year my mom asked me to file my grandmothers taxes for her. Of course I say yes, I mean how difficult can it be. I’ve never had a problem with mine in the past. She gets a pension and social security, sounds basic enough. Well, after hours trying to figure out her taxes I’m just about ready to smash my computer against the wall. It doesn’t help that grandma is breathing down my neck because she’s worried she might owe the IRS some money, and if she owes money she will surely need to go bankrupt, because she is already poor. Why is it that despite how much money older people have they always think they’re poor?

What I’d really like to know is why old people have to file taxes in the first place. Is the government secretly trying to kill them off by giving them all heart attacks? My grandma is 82 years old. I think that by the time you turn 80 everyone should automatically receive a “get out of jail free card.” Don’t you think so? I think they have pretty much earned the right to just let it ride for the time they have left. She has paid her debt to society and deserves to live the rest of her life free and clear. I’m almost positive she’s at home right now trying to watch the 11:00pm news but can’t stop worrying about these taxes. By the time April 15th comes around she will definitely need to restock the Xanax supply.

What is the moral of the story? It’s impossible to beat. We will all be old one day, and yes we too will think we are broke and poor. So be patient with your elders and remember it will one day be you sitting in their chair looking for your “get out of jail free card.”

Just a day in the life...

I'll Take My Disappointment Double Bagged Please

It’s Thursday night and you’re getting ready for bed. It’s been a long week and you’re really tired, but tomorrow is Friday. So you know there’s light at the end of the tunnel, because tomorrow night is date night. A night out for the two of you to just relax, reconnect, and have some fun. You know that feeling you get? That feeling of excitement and anticipation. You go to sleep with great expectations for tomorrow. You spring out of bed a little easier in the morning, because no matter what today holds you have something to look forward to tonight.

Now put the brakes on, last minute change in plans, date night is canceled. How do you feel? There’s a pretty good chance you’re feeling disappointed. We’ve all felt disappointment at some time in our lives. Whether it be disappointment in our spouse, our children, or even just the circumstances in our lives at the time. Nevertheless the disappointment feels the same. We feel angry, let down, put off, unimportant, taken for granted, and sometimes bitter. Why do we have these feelings? Because we had expectations, and these expectations weren’t met.

What do we do with all this disappointment? We first ask ourselves if we’re relaying on someone else to make us happy, which is easy to do without even realizing it. Do we expect someone else to be able to read our minds? You bet we do. I have a mental picture of the garbage can in the kitchen overflowing. It’s that cereal box that is just barely balanced on top of all the other garbage and while your husband stands in front of it he asks, do you need me to do anything honey? Your mouth doesn’t even move, you just let your eyes glare down at the overflowing garbage can. Oh, what do you know, a light goes off in his head. Do you need me to take out the trash? Now the mouth opens and you say, actually I was thinking that maybe the garbage would just grow some legs and walk itself out. I mean isn’t sarcasm always the best answer? Even though it seemed very obvious to me, I expected someone else to read my mind. I’m disappointed because I naturally expect him to know what I need. Wouldn’t it be much easier to simply ask for what we need? That way there’s no room for confusion. Now the garbage is out and everyone is happy.

What is the moral of the story? We need to be careful we don’t have unrealistic expectations. The next time we’re tempted to say that we’re disappointed in someone, maybe we should instead say I’m disillusioned in you. Somehow my interpretation of reality may have been inaccurate. Now that’s a bitter pill to swallow.

Just a day in the life…

Whooper vs. Treadmill

I was watching the Today Show this morning and Natalie Morales did a segment with Dr. Nancy Snyderman titled “An Hour A Day Keeps The Weight Away." A new study involving 34,000 middle age women suggests that the current government guidelines regarding women and exercising are not enough. Currently the government guidelines suggest that women should aim for 30 minutes of exercise at least five days a week, in order to maintain their current weight. Studies suggest that on average women tend to gain 1-½ lbs. per year, which over the years tend to add up. However, the new study suggests that in order to maintain weight women need to aim for one hour of exercise seven days a week. WHAT?!? I’d like to know if this so called panel of experts in charge of this study may have been smoking crack while this study was taking place. At least then it would make a little more sense. I’m struggling just to find 30-40 minutes five days a week…and if I’m lucky I might even be able to squeeze in a shower.

This is my fourth week of my new exercise regimen, which consists of trying to run three miles at least five days a week. I’m actually at the point where I look forward to running because I feel so good afterwards. I also seem to watch what I eat a little more mostly because of the effort I’m putting into running.

On Monday I had a doctors appointment in Dearborn. Did I mention I was hungry on the way to my appointment? I was there for about two hours. So as you can imagine, on the way home I was starving. I could barely concentrate on driving because I couldn’t get the thought of a Whopper out of my head. I would normally take Southfield Freeway to 75 South, which would be the fastest. Instead I decide to take Outer Drive to Pelham until in turns into Allen Road. I think subconsciously I just happen to remember there is as Burger King on the corner of Allen Road and Northline. At this point I still have no intentions of stopping. As I get closer to Northline I continue to stay in the right hand lane. I’m probably going about 45 miles per hour when I make the split decision to turn into Burger King. I pull into the drive thru with tires smoking, I may have even been on two wheels, I don’t know. I order a Whooper with cheese and I can actually taste it as I’m ordering. I immediately start unwrapping that bad boy as I’m driving and oh boy is it good. But, you know how the bun is always a lot bigger than the actual burger? Well, at this point I’ve managed to finish the burger in under a minute. Now I’m debating on whether or not I should just toss the rest. I can’t do it, so at this point I proceed to eat the mayonnaise bread. Wow, talk about feeling guilty. Satisfied but guilty.

The moral of this story? Always take the Freeway whenever possible and by all means avoid the side roads at all cost! They’re deadly.

Just a day in the life…

Faith Sold Separately

It was back in mid November before Thanksgiving that it all started. I didn’t know at the time that my world as I knew it was about to be turned upside down. It was then that I slowly started to lose something so precious to me without even realizing that I was losing it. I thought it was my hope, or was it my faith? Here is my question to you. Is it possible to have hope without faith? You may think the relationship between faith and hope is obvious but actually it’s a bit more complex than that.

So what was this earth-shattering event that took place? Someone did something unthinkable to my little boy, and this unthinkable act took place at our church camp. A place where our family vacationed for ten days every year. A place I felt to be sacred where I myself have actually felt the presence of God. To say my faith was shaken is an understatement. It was absolutely shattered. I’ve never felt so many emotions at one time before. I felt angry, hurt, confused, betrayed, vulnerable, and empty. I tried desperately to remind myself that God was in control. I tried to grasp and take hold of God’s promises. But how could this happen? Why? I now questioned everything that I believed in.

I’ve always thought of myself as having a strong faith. I have been through many trials and despite the doubts and pain that had accompanied each one; I have always felt that in the end there was lesson that was learned and that my faith had been made stronger. I admit that I’m not a very trusting person and that I struggle in this area. These past trials have made me very aware that I have absolutely no control over them and have forced me to learn to trust. My only option was to trust. So why was this so different? The difference was that this trial had nothing to do with an illness such as cancer or a martial problem, as hard as those both may be. This was my child and probably any mother’s worst nightmare. At this point, all bets are off.

Someone once told me that just because you believe something to be true still doesn’t make it true. He does not believe in God. He believes that people choose to believe in God out of fear and the need to have something to believe in. In essence he believes it to be a coping mechanism. With all that was going on in my life at the time, this really put me over the edge and made me ask myself the question. Why do I believe what I believe? How do I know that it’s true? And so the search began.

What is faith and how does it differ from belief? True faith is trusting in God. We trust in God to take care of us. Trust means a willingness to put ourselves under Him, not out of fear but out of love. When we trust God, we love Him. Faith can be defined as a belief in the truth without having justification or logical proof. I think St. Anselm best captured the essence of faith when he said, “I do not seek to understand so that I may believe, but I believe so that I may understand, and what is more I believe that unless I do believe I shall not understand.” I think he’s right in that how can we understand something that we don’t believe in.

Faith is an expression of the present but hope is directed more towards the future. Faith is the result of our beliefs that we have gained through our experiences, whereas hope is the product of our desires. Now back to my original question, can we have hope without faith? The answer is no, we can’t have hope without faith. When we have hope we have faith that says, I believe that the future will be better, although we have no grounds to prove our hopeful assumptions, yet we still have faith in them. While faith without hope is possible, hope without faith is not. I’ll give you the analogy that best helped me to understand. Let’s use oxygen and fire as an example. Oxygen is necessary for fire. If we have fire we can know that oxygen is present. Lucky for us, oxygen isn’t sufficient for fire though. Faith is necessary for our hope but faith isn’t sufficient for our hope because we can have faith about many things and yet still have no real hope. This is the lesson from the book of Job. Often the truest faith comes in the absence of the fulfillment of our directed intention.

God is faithful. We have all heard the saying that “He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear” (1 Corinthians 10:13). Sometimes I definitely wish that I wouldn’t be able to handle the things that God seems to think I can handle. I often wonder if He has a sense of humor. Hope, faith, and love are the very essence of Christianity. Christ is the actual object of the believer’s hope, and the hope that is set before us is eternal life.

So what is the moral of this story? I’m still learning to trust, but I have faith that God will do something great out of such a tragic situation, and most of all hope that one day we will all be fully restored.

Just a day in the life…

Scoop or Scrape

My very first post…how exciting. I sometimes feel as if my life is sort of like the movie Groundhog’s Day. Wake up, get the kids dressed, get the kids breakfast, make lunches, get a few kids on the bus, get the other one to preschool, pickup from preschool, clean-up, do laundry, get a few kids off the bus, eat dinner, do homework, go to either soccer, gymnastics, or hockey, get the kids bathed, and try and convince them it’s bedtime…yes even though the sun is still out. It does make for a long day and yes it’s tiring, but more than anything, the same thing day in and day out just becomes downright boring.

Today was a little different however. Instead of running inside on the treadmill I decided to run outside with my dogs, one at a time at least. Did I mention that they just turned a year old? This is also the first time they’ve been on a leash this year. Yeah I know I’m a bad dog owner…get over it. I decide to take Coco first because she is the calmest. I get her leash all hooked up and get the little baggie ready just in case she decides to do her business during our run. We start off walking and she’s doing great, getting the hang of it. Now it’s time to pick up the pace and start running. Still doing good…running…running…wait a second…you have got to be kidding me. What kind of stupid dog takes a running crap on the sidewalk, in front of the neighbor’s house that just happens to be home? That would be my dog. Now I have to stop running, bend over and try to pick up the trail of hot mushy dog crap off the sidewalk that just smears. At this point I’m asking myself, what is appropriate after you have picked up the large chunks? Do I continue to try and scrape off any smeared remains or just save face and start running again? Just in case you were wondering, I did try to scrape and that wasn’t working so I just kept on running. We ran straight back to the house where I dropped her off from her first and last run of her life. I love her to death but I’ve always said she is definitely special. I think she has gone FULL TART (Tropic Thunder).

So what exactly is the moral of this story? I’m not really sure just yet. But what I do know is that even though it’s only 10:00 in the morning, this could very well be the biggest highlight of my day…and that’s scary!

Just a day in the life…