Clean the Glass

Yesterday at work, I saw a message scrawled into the seat of a bench.  It read: “Today was a bad day.  Tomorrow will be better.”

I took a picture of it, because it gave me pause.  What is the story behind that?  Some poor kid had such a terrible day, that he was compelled to scrawl that message on the bench.  Yet, he still maintained the belief that tomorrow will be better.

There’s something about it that moves me.  The simultaneous pain and hope.  What did this kid experience that was so bad?  And what a wonderful outlook to say, that yes, tomorrow is a new day. 

I don’t know.  I feel like I was that kid, but I never had the strength or the courage to think that, yes, today is the worst, but that doesn’t mean tomorrow will be.

It’s kind of parallel to things that are happening to us right now.  For years now, I’ve been the realist.  The one always bracing for the next blow.  Haley is the optimist.  But, now, especially with the move coming up and our landlord taking full advantage of our lease, things aren’t exactly easy.  And since we haven’t been able to afford therapy in a while, and her meds are taking forever to fill, she’s really struggling.  She can’t really see that the glass is half full, because the glass itself is so cloudy and dark.

So it kind of falls to me to be the one who will carve that message into a bench.  It something I have to believe.  This is a role I’m not used to, but I’ve gotta do it for her.  It’s become my daily motto.  Though life is tough right now, there is a wonderful future just over the next hill.  On top of that, we don’t face it alone.  Together, she and I can ‘take on the whole empire [ourselves].’