I wrote a long blog post written about a girl in my religion class who constantly sits in the lefty desk I claimed on the first day of this semester. After living eighteen years in a right-handed world, it was a relief to discover desks made for lefties like me. My quiet rage at the stoic, right-handed girl who sits in my seat should be understandable. Right?
But I’ve decided not to post it.
Some things have happened in the last few days that have changed my perspective on what’s important, and in a rather drastic way. Without getting too specific, I’ll just say that a sweet, lovely girl I know has just lost nearly everything dear to her: her parents.
Yeah, that’s a hefty one. I can’t even imagine what it would be like, so I’ll just refrain from trying to talk about how sad and awful that must be.
It just breaks my heart that something so terrible could happen to someone so wonderful. I don’t know this girl very well, but I’ve never seen her unhappy and I’ve never seen her use those misfortunes to her own advantage. And when I look at her, I see light and life and love, and I know she has a heart big enough to hold the whole world inside it.
Cue the cliché thankfulness post.
Since the new year, I’ve been making an effort every day to complain less and appreciate positivity in my life. It’s been challenging; I’ve endured some brutal criticism and catty non-confrontation in the last three months. Luckily, I have a pretty amazing source of positivity right now, and he reminds me constantly of what’s good in my life – and in all of life, for that matter.
But this really did it for me. Seeing such a sweet girl endure such thorough devastation and still come out smiling turned out to be exactly the inspiration I needed to embrace the good in my life and to let go of the negative.
Suddenly my passive-aggressive battle for the lefty desk is totally insignificant. And I don’t care at all that ignorant, awful people comment mean things on my online news stories. Even this week’s six looming story deadlines and above-average pollen count can’t get me down. I’m good. I’m good.
