Happy Monday

Do you ever wish you could stop time? How relaxing would it be to simply pause everything? You could finally catch up on all the work deadlines and personal projects. In my case, I could read my bookshelf and finish the sweater I’ve been knitting for months. I could learn a few new recipes and practice them before returning to the daily rhythm. I could complete the paint by numbers that’s been gathering dust in the corner and I could get moving on a story I’ve been trying to write since I was a Junior in high school. I could at last tidy up my apartment to my satisfaction and handle all the outstanding paperwork that constantly drags down my To Do list.

Alas, time waits for no one. Were I a witch, I might have been able to secure a time turner but I never received my Hogwarts letter and could hardly be entrusted with such an important artifact. I don’t really want to turn back time. There isn’t a single thing I’d change if I could do it all over again. Even my mistakes put me on the path to where I am now. But it would be nice to put it all on hold for a while. It’s like a crazy day at work when the phone rings off the hook and people keep popping their heads into your office, demanding your attention. Everything seems to need doing right this second and you can’t quite catch your breath long enough to focus on even a single task. Sometimes all you want to do is close your door, unplug the phone and get to work.

Well, today is a new day. There’s no time turner or magical pause button. Just you, doing the very best you can. Don’t forget that even on a groggy, busy Monday morning, you are enough.

Happy Monday everyone! It’s easy on days like these to beat myself up over all the things that I should have accomplished over the weekend but didn’t. But that rarely bodes well for the rest of the week and I’d like to start fresh. Instead of lamenting all the things that went wrong this weekend, here are a few things that went right.

Caught up with a friend over coffee – Most of my regular social groups have been on hold since the first COVID shutdowns so it was nice to meet face to face for a chat about all that’s happened in the last year.
Got involved at church – I have officially been recruited to assist with Life Teen ministry. I’m still not sure what inspired me to say yes to this but I’m so glad I did. Every week it seems like I’m signing up for something new and coming one step closer to this community.
Met a few new faces – The woman who befriended me and first invited me to join the Life Teen team is one of the most well connected people I’ve ever met. She’s a smiling face that everyone recognizes and loves to introduce this newcomer to all of her friends in the parish.
Finished the weekend with a clean kitchen – There’s still some meal prep left to do but it’s so much easier to approach a new week with a tidy kitchen. That early morning coffee is made all the better for it.
It snowed! – That’s a bit of an understatement. I came to a newfound appreciation for the term “lake effect” yesterday when I was digging a path for my car to back out of the apartment parking lot. Snow had piled up in great drifts on the right side of all the cars in the lot like it had been blizarding sideways for most of the night. Although I spent 20 minutes trying to extricate my car without a shovel and eventually ended up enlisting the help of some friendly apartment employees with a small snowplow, it all worked out in the end.

Little moments like these are necessary reminders that the world is full of good people who are happy and willing to lend a hand, whether it be to introduce you to new friends at church or to push your car to freedom on a snowy winter day.